Unstoppable force meets immovable object

As the second half of the season winds down, the Greenwave varsity football team remains undefeated in league play after beating the Sparks Railroaders 48-0.

While the Wave is currently 7-1 overall and 7-0 in D1-A, their next game pits them against fellow undefeated Spring Creek Spartans, 6-1 overall and 6-0 in D1-A to see who stays on top of the pile.

Fallon coach Brooke Hill was nonetheless pleased with the Wave’s performance against the Railroaders.

“Well I think they just executed the game plan like they always do,” Hill said about the Wave as a team. “The kids are pretty good at understanding what we’re trying to do against the teams that we play. We obviously vary things a bit depending on who we’re playing, so we went to work last Monday and we really executed on both the offensive and defensive sides.”

The game against Spring Creek is heavily anticipated as a tough away game for the Wave.

“Well, you know they’re good, and it’s going to be up there, and that’s why you play these games,” Hill said. “You play these games to be in situations like this. Two undefeated teams going on the road, hostile environment, trying to find a way to win.”

The game against the Railroaders produced one of the strongest performances from the Wave both offensively and defensively all season, bringing the score to 48-0 by the end of the first half, where it would stay throughout the second half to the end of the game.

Aside from impressive performances by Connor Nelson, Cade Vercellotti and Brock Uptain, Bryson Abe had more carries than any other player in the game and nearly had several touchdowns of his own, helping to drive the Wave to the first and goal several times throughout the third and fourth quarter.

“Bryson works hard in practice and that was a game where we could get a lot of our backups in, and he did a really good job,” Hill said. “He tried to get it in there at the end, but we’re not out to embarrass anybody so when we got the chance to take a knee we did that.”

On Tuesday, a serious motor vehicle accident involving four Churchill County High School students, two of whom play on the varsity football team, sent one of the Wave’s starters into surgery. Hill said that the injured player is going to be OK after surgery but will be out of play for the rest of the season.

Hill said he was glad to know the two boys were OK, and that the game against Spring Creek would be tougher in light of losing one of his own for the rest of the season.

“Obviously, we need guys to step up with him being out now,” Hill said. “We’ve got good depth, guys have got some experience playing. He (the injured player) has been starting really well for us but Porto will have to step up and carry a little bigger. So some guys I’ve been playing but obviously haven’t been playing as much are going to be playing a lot more.”

When asked about the game after the Spartans against the Fernley Vaqueros, a rival from past games and their proximity to Fallon, Hill said Fernley was still a week away and that the Wave would remain 100 percent focused on the Spartans.

“They’re a good football team, and they’ve got speed,” Hill said about Spring Creek. “They’ve got some athletes that can cause us some problems that we haven’t seen yet this year. Hopefully, we’re balanced enough in the fact that we’re 50/50 run/pass and that we spread the ball around. Should be tough to double anybody, but they’re very good and I’m sure they’re going to be coached well and have some surprises for us. Again, like always it’s going to be about how we adjust off of those things that they do.”