‘When you get the ball ... score’: No. 5 Inderkum wallops No. 18 Woodcreek

Woodcreek High School has had a running clock in each of its seven games this season. But Friday, for homecoming against No. 5 Inderkum, the No. 18 Timberwolves experienced what it’s like to be on the losing end.

Inderkum thumped their hosts 51-7 in a Capital Valley Conference matchup of two previously unbeaten teams. It was Inderkum’s fifth consecutive game forcing a running clock.

Johnny Williams and Savien Pressley each had a pair of rushing touchdowns. Williams scored from 1 and 2 yards out, while Pressley had the style plays with dashes of 16 and 17 yards.

Inderkum coach Terry Stark took some good-natured ribbing before the game that his teams haven’t passed out of the Wing-T in more than a decade. With the speed his teams have had over the years, why throw? Stark was quick with a retort.

“Hey, we threw the ball the third play of the game last week,” Stark said. “But it is safer to run the ball.”

JJ Ray threw the ball plenty Friday night, including a 19-yard strike to Aaron Espero in the second quarter. But the four-headed hydra backfield of Williams, Pressley, Espero and Raymond Brown were just too much for the Timberwolves, who had allowed just 75 points all season.

Inderkum has five runners with 200 or more yards this season, led by Brown, who had 698 yards before Friday’s game. He had a 1-yard TD run to key a 21-point third quarter. Stark has the enviable problem of trying to keep his big, strong, fast and hungry backfield happy. When asked how he does it, his answer was simple.

“You don’t,” he said.

“They count carries,” he continued. “These kids are into highlights, into stats. ‘He’s getting more than me,’ they’ll say and we just tell them that’s the way it is. When you get the ball … score. But that’s nothing new. That’s the way it’s always been. So do something with it when you get it.”

Stark said he wasn’t sure what caliber of team he had at the season’s outset. But Stark Industries keeps turning out iron men.

“Our secondary is completely new; we don’t have the speed we’ve had in the secondary, the receivers or the backfield,” Stark said. “And we have an inexperienced QB. But we have pretty solid lines on both sides of the ball. Good passing teams can present a problem for us.”

The matchup Friday was going to be between Woodcreek do-it-all quarterback Carter Krupp and the Tigers’ defense. The veer offense against a defense Stark dusted off that was en vogue when players wore leather helmets. Krupp was responsible for 25 of the team’s 40 touchdowns coming into Friday, but he found his receivers blanketed, and he found himself under pressure throughout. In the first half, Woodcreek’s two first downs came on Inderkum penalties.

“We do something that is old-school football with our linebackers and the teams that scout us know what it is,” Stark said. “We do something a little different that came from the 1940s and 1950s when everyone was running the wishbone and all that. I got it from (Mira Loma High coaching legends) Jerry Kundert and Don Brown. Very few people run that defense anymore. It works well against the veer.”

For example, outside linebacker Isiah Ward would cheat up like an extra defensive end and disrupt the Timberwolves’ offense either at the line or, more often, in the backfield.

“We’ve seen them defend the veer against Elk Grove (a 37-13 Inderkum win) but we’re a little different and not your traditional veer or flexbone, we’re a little more spread out,” Woodcreek co-coach Kyle Stowers said. “We’re a little unique, so I think that stuff from the 50s and 60s … our offense is a little different. We’re more modern, more spread out.”

Inderkum prevented Woodcreek from scoring until Krupp broke free for a 13-yard keeper at the end of the third quarter. The Tigers led at that point, 44-0.

Krupp never leaves the field and is, by far, the team’s most valuable player.

“He’s a stud, and as good as he is on the field he’s better off,” Stowers said. “He’s one of the best leaders we’ve had in my six years here and obviously on the field he’s pretty dynamic. He throws, runs, probably is our best defensive player, kicks, he punts. You name it. I don’t know if there’s a better all-around player in the area.”

Friday night, Inderkum’s defense made him look average and the Tigers’ offense made Woodcreek look at their first running clock – from the losing end.