'Preaching physicality': How Bloomington North football's ground game buried rival South

In short-yardage plays on fourth down or inside the 5-yard line, Bloomington North had one play call and it worked every time.

For many, many years, this has not been the Cougar Way. Especially not against rival Bloomington South, which won the line of scrimmage far more often in their meetings over the years. But North's front five, Isley Adamson, Isa Muhammed, Jake Johnson, Traeh Young and Andy Lewis lined up and took over Friday night.

North gained 230 yards on 54 carries, with Dash King scoring three times and Noah Ferree and Shaun Cooper each rushing for 91 yards in a 31-14 Conference Indiana football statement win for the host Cougars in front of over 2,500.

"All year, coaches, players have been preaching physicality," Young said. "Especially this week. It was just physical, physical, physical. That's the one way you beat South.

Video highlights: WATCH NOW: Big hits, big scores as Bloomington North takes on South in football

"Up front, we were all physical but you have to trust the guy next to you that he's going to do what he needs to do. And when you can run the ball four or five yards on a wedge play on fourth-and-1, you can't ask for any more than that."

Interestingly enough, the last time North topped South by 17 or more was head coach Anthony Lindsey's senior season of 2003 when he passed the Cougars to a 38-20 win. But the old QB doesn't want this team slinging it around as much as he had to. The idea is to go to the air when North wants to, not because it has to.

"It's a physicality game," Lindsey said. "Whose going to be the more physical team? Our mindset has been to run the ball. And this is the game plan because that's what it leads us to."

And consistently getting into third and short situations made it easy to keep drives going piled up over 28 minutes of possession and quickly put South in a bind in the fourth quarter.

"Even when they know it's coming and you can run the ball, that's a good sign for our offense," Lindsey said.

King shared the load equally this week as Ferree and Cooper came up with several big runs to keep drives alive and kept a freshmen set of legs coming at South's defense all night.

"It's a fundamental sport and without fundamentals, you can't get anywhere," Cooper said. "And (the O-line) will prove and continue to prove every week like they have been that they'll get better. The holes are wide open. We get more yards. Those are my boys. They showed out tonight."

But King was still a force when it mattered most. Five times North ran a quarterback sneak and five times it turned into two first downs and three touchdowns. And no 'tush push' was needed, just the bulldozers up front. Young and the rest of the offensive line are thrilled with that.

"I love it," Young said. "The team is finally starting to trust the O-line that we can put the team on our backs and do what we need to do to win."

Four turnovers doom South

In addition to the issues trying to stop North's run game, South turned it over four times with Drew Zurbuch picking off two passes, the first when he jumped a route on sophomore quarterback Duncan Combs' first throw of the game.

"Everything is such a learning mechanism for him right now," South coach Gabe Johnson said of his QB. "So as long as he is willing to come back and learn and grow from it, he'll get better. And I have no doubt that he'll do that."

Turnovers have been a staple of North's defense this season.

"Turnovers are everything," Zurbuch said. "Turnovers spark the game. Turnovers create life for the offense. So if you can, a turnover is the biggest thing for the defense."

Former Panther Noah Hernandez had a strip sack and fumble recovery to start the second quarter that led to a North field goal. Then Zurbuch and Luke Freel added two more picks in the fourth quarter to stunt the Panthers' comeback plans when they had great field position and the door was open for a rally like the one they had at Martinsville.

"We had a speck of trying to give ourselves some hope there," Johnson said. "You get the ball back on those two series in good field position you've got to get points. I don't care if it's a field goal. But we can't turn it over."

The last time North ran the ball that well vs. the Panthers was in 2020 when running back Cody Mikulich and quarterback Reece Lozano went for over 300 total but the defense wasn't up to the task in a stunning 44-37 overtime loss. It was this time.

"I think they were a little more physical than us, obviously," Johnson said. "And that's not a good thing. That's the thing I take away from this that I don't like more than anything.

"So we'll back to the film and get better. We got beat by a good team tonight."

South was limited to a season-low 118 rushing yards while Combs was just 11-of-22 for 105 yards.

"I give a lot of credit to our defensive coordinators," Zurbuch said. "Especially coach (Kenny) Davis, coach (Paul) Prather, Sam (Werczynski). Those guys spend a lot of hours for us getting us prepared for these games. I think this is a special group on defense and the coaches are a big part to it."

North strikes twice to take over

The turning point of the evening came after Bryce Taylor's 52-yard punt rolled dead at the North 6 with 5:39 left in the first half and North nursing a 10-7 lead.

It was a 13-play drive and it was in trouble at one point when King was swallowed up on third and 12 at midfield. But a Panther lost his cool and the 15-yard penalty enabled North to keep marching.

On third and 12 at the 32 after a holding call, King went back to pass again, only this time, the rush was a tick too late as King lofted a 32-yard TD pass to Jorian Brooks with 38.9 left in the third to make it 17-7.

North was set to receive the opening kickoff of the second half.

"That drive right there is probably going to win the game," Lindsey said at halftime.

It did. North went 80 yards, helped by a ridiculous catch by Jalen Williams leaping back over his defender to make the grab for a 32-yard gain to the South 18. Five plays later, King was plowing in from the 3 for a 24-7 lead.

"We knew we were already up and the biggest thing was running the clock," Young said. "So we knew we were going to run the ball, again and again and again. We knew that we're conditioned and ready we knew we can run it down people's throats and they're going to get more tired than we are."

BLOOMINGTON NORTH 31, BLOOMINGTON SOUTH 14

Bloomington South (2-2, 1-1 CI) 7 | 0 | 7 | 0 — 14

Bloomington North (3-1, 2-0) 7 | 10 | 7 | 7 — 31

FIRST QUARTER

S: Sam Giles 9 pass from Duncan Combs (Bryce Taylor kick), 7:39. S, 7-0.

N: Dash King 1 run (Joe Luther kick), 2:37. Tied, 7-7.

SECOND QUARTER

N: Luther 25 FG, 8:48. N, 10-7.

N: Jorian Brooks 32 pass from King (Luther kick), :38.9. N, 17-7.

THIRD QUARTER

N: King 3 run (Luther kick), 7:08. N 24-7.

S: Thomas Gill 1 pass from Combs (Taylor kick), :51.3. N, 24-14.

FOURTH QUARTER

N: King 1 run (Luther kick), 2:52. N 31-14.

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING

Bloomington South (25-118): Braylen Townsend 21-111, Sam Giles 3-4, Hayden Clark 1-3.

Bloomington North (54-230): Noah Ferree 16-91, Shaun Cooper 19-91, Dash King 19-48.

PASSING

Bloomington South (11-22-3-105): Combs 11-22-3-105.

Bloomington North (6-12-0-133): King 6-12-0-133.

RECEIVING

Bloomington South: Connor Parker 5-63, Thomas Gill 4-13, Sam Giles 2-29.

Bloomington North: Jalen Williams 2-64, Jorian Brooks 2-47, Cooper 2-22.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Bloomington North football's ground game put rival South away