The South Hamilton Hawks football team returned to action on Friday night, as they made the road trip east on Highway 20 to take on the Dike-New Hartford Wolverines in the 2nd Round of the Class 1A Playoffs at the Gunderson Sports Complex in Dike. South Hamilton entered at 5-4, while Dike-New Hartford entered at 8-1 and ranked #2 in the class.
South Hamilton’s first drive was shut down on 4th down, as the Wolverines scored with the short field, off an 8-yard jet touch pass from Colin Meester to Devon Lotts to put the Wolverines up 7-0. South Hamilton was forced into a 3-and-out on its ensuing drive, and the Wolverines capitalized again on a 10-yard Noah Borcherding touchdown run to put D-NH up 14-0. The Wolverines would force a stop and score quickly again, this time on a 30-yard touchdown run by Noah Borcherding to put D-NH up 21-0. South Hamilton would get the offense going after that, as a 38-yard pass from Braden Young to Nick Severseike set up a 20-yard touchdown run by Kolby Hodnefield to bring the score to 21-6. Dike-New Hartford would then rattle off 4 straight scores in the 2nd quarter, including 2 runs from Noah Borcherding, a Colin Meester pass to Carson Cosetllo and a Tyson Bennett blocked punt and return to bring the halftime score to 48-6 in favor of Dike-New Hartford.
The Wolverines started the 2nd half with a bang, as Jake Reicks returns the opening kick 70 yards for a score, to put the Wolverines ahead 55-6. From there, D-NH would begin rotating players out as the Hawks put together two scoring drives in the 2nd half, one capped by a Braden Young quarterback sneak, the other capped by an Ashton Williams 5-yard run to bring the final to 55-22.
The KQWC Player of the Game was South Hamilton senior running back Nick Severseike, who rushed for 151 yards on 17 carries in his final game in a Hawk uniform. Kolby Hodnefield rushed for 84 yards and a touchdown, while Braden Young went 3-for-6 passing for 45 yards and an interception.
Dike-New Hartford will host South Hardin in the Class 1A quarterfinals at 7 PM on Friday Night in Dike. South Hamilton’s season ends with a record of 5-5.