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Fremd hangs on against Prospect

It's rerun season at Fremd.

For the second consecutive week, Fremd bolted to a huge halftime lead - only to have to hang on for a victory.

Fremd roared to a 28-7 lead at halftime over Prospect on Friday in Palatine. But Fremd had to endure a furious second half rally by the Knights, which include an onside kick recovery in the final 30 seconds, to edge Prospect 42-35.

"We are not going to be a good team until we learn to finish ball games," said Fremd coach Lou Sponsel, whose team nearly blew a 28-3 against Elk Grove a week ago before winning 42-28.

"We just play very undisciplined football in the second half. I know Danny (Davis) and the defensive staff will fix things up. We just were very undisciplined in lots of little phases of the game on defense."

Fremd (3-0) looked like world-beaters in the first half.

Running behind an offensive line of Matt Payne, Will Pankratz, Riley Carlson Max Carver, Ethan Hansen and Kyle Saxon, the Vikings moved the ball at will, running up 28 points.

The Vikings were also stout defensively. Let by Matt McCabe, Jimmy Walsh, Carlson, Alex Jacobs, Saxon, Mike Skolik, Jake Haas and Kenny Lyke, Fremd held Prospect to just 47 yards rushing.

Fremd built that first-half lead thanks to a 5-yard run by Kenny Lyke that capped a 15-play drive on the game's first series. Tommy Josten fired 9-yard touchdown passes to Austin Schwantz and Cordell Finley. The Vikings also scored on the defensive side when Jimmy Walsh recovered a loose ball in the end zone following a bad snap on a punt.

"The offense has been on the edge for a while," said Josten, who was 14-of-23 for 210 yards. "But we played great today and broke through."

Prospect was able to only get on the board when D'Angelo Roberson picked off an errant pass and scored on a 26-yard return.

But it was a different Prospect team that took the field in the second half.

"We asked our kids at halftime to deal with real adversity," Prospect coach Mike Sebestyen said. "We wanted to know if we are fake tough, or can we fight back? And we fought back."

Prospect went 82 yards on a drive that took nearly eight minutes to close the gap to 28-14 on a 6-yard run by Bobby Jarosz. That drive was aided by 4 Fremd penalties that gave Prospect first downs on each occasion to extend the drive.

Fremd came right back when Finley hauled down a 47-yard touchdown pass from Josten as the Vikings rebuilt their lead to 35-14 with 3:24 left in the third quarter.

"I was really disappointed in the way I played in the first game," said Finley, who had 6 catches for 132 yards. "I dropped way too many passes. But our line did a great job of blocking and giving Tommy time to find me."

Prospect also found its blocking, and began to run the option with success against the Vikings.

Andrew Shafis had a 2-yard run and Jarosz blasted off an 80-yard run off the option to close the gap to 35-28 with 9:02 to play.

Fremd put together a nice long drive behind Lyke, who finished it off when an 11-yard burst to make it 42-28 with 5:29 left.

But Prospect, which would rush for 265 yards in the second half, was not done.

The Knights moved the ball down the ball down the field and tallied with 35.2 seconds left on a 2-yard run by Matt Drew (18 carries, 88 years) to close within 42-35.

Jarosz, who finished with 178 yards on 29 carries, then recovered the ensuing onside kick to keep the Knights in the game. They were able to drive to the Fremd 40, but fumbled a pitch on the final play to end the threat.

"It is about the process, not just the result," said Sponsel, whose team was whistled 13 times for 134 yards. "We are trying to be a very good football team. But we can't play like that."

Images: Fremd beats Prospect 42-35

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