MEDFORD 44, WAUSAU EAST 6 RUNNING DOWNHILL - Rothmeier racks up 290 yards in rout

MEDFORD 44, WAUSAU EAST 6

RUNNING DOWNHILL

Word on the Medford football sideline during Friday’s first half was that homecoming king Paxton Rothmeier wasn’t feeling all that well.

You’d have a hard time convincing Wausau East of that.

On a night where the Raiders put up one of their best all-around performances of their 5-1 season, Rothmeier’s 290 rushing yards on 24 attempts was most impressive. The runaway leading candidate as the Great Northern Conference’s top offensive player for 2024 got the majority of those yards after contact, spinning out of would-be tackles, running over tacklers and just plain refusing to go down as the Raiders rolled to a 44-6 win over the Lumberjacks, who would’ve pulled into a tie for the GNC lead with an upset.

By the opening moments of the third quarter, that upset had no chance of happening.

“No, I was not feeling good,” Rothmeier said after three more touchdowns pushed his season total to 16. He’s now at 1,254 rushing yards for the fall after his career high Friday. “I was just remembering the hard work we put in during the off-season. I didn’t want to let the guys down, so I just came and gave it my best all the time.”

“It was fun to watch,” his backfield mate Evan Wilkins said. “Everyone was laying great blocks, and he’s making guys miss after the play.”

“The offensive line was in a groove,” quarterback Parker Lissner said. “They communicated. It was awesome to watch.”

“They were fantastic,” Rothmeier added.

Lissner had a big night, completing five of seven passes for 101 yards and two touchdowns. Defensively, Medford bent a little in the first quarter, but controlled the line of scrimmage after that and held East’s capable passing game to just one early touchdown. The Raiders forced four turnovers and turned the last one into points on Wilkins’ clinching 56-yard interception return on the second play of the fourth quarter.

“Both sides of the ball played fairly well,” head coach Ted Wilson said. “After watching film there are little things here and there, but the big portion of the product was looking pretty good. I thought the kids blocked well. I thought we pass blocked well and I thought defensively we played very well.”

Rothmeier got warmed up with a 30yard first carry and a 24-yard fourth carry of the game. The second one set up Lissner’s first touchdown pass, a 36yarder to Evan Paul that put Medford up 8-0 with 4:22 left in the first quarter.

“I think it was just blown coverage,” Lissner said. “But our offensive line blocked well and I just gave him a ball he could go up and grab it.”

The Lumberjacks answered with a 56yard scoring drive that included two completions from quarterback Davis Winter and ended with a third, a nice leaping grab to their top receiver, Jesse Napgezek, in the back corner of the end zone for a 10-yard touchdown. The twopoint pass failed, keeping Medford in front 8-6.

Napgezek, who caught two big touchdowns in East’s big 23-22 win over Mosinee the previous week, was held to two catches for 28 yards by the Raiders, who also limited running back Iain Stahel to 61 yards on 15 attempts. Medford had a 425-187 advantage in total yardage.

“We did a great job defensively containing them for what they have,” Rothmeier said. “They live off explosive plays and we stopped that.”

“It helps to get up big, get up by a couple scores so they feel like they have to throw the ball more,” Wilson said. “Then we were able to go more into our nickel set and really try to lock down on their best wide receiver, Napgezek. I think their running game getting shut down was more a product of us being able to get up by a couple of scores and them kind of abandoning it. We did play fairly well with a six-man box to prevent them from running the ball. For the first quarter, quarter and a half, we pretty much played our base 5-2 and manned up on (Napgezek) because I was a little worried about their running game because their back is pretty good.”

Medford’s pretty good back got rolling on the next drive as runs of 16 and 32 set up Rothmeier’s 1-yard touchdown run. Lissner completed the two-point pass to Wilkins for a 16-6 lead. Wilkins rocked Davis with a hard hit in front of Medford’s sideline on a fourth-down scramble and forced a fumble that was recovered by Tucyr Smola to end the last East threat at Medford’s 23. While Medford’s ensuing possession ended in a punt, the field position flipped after East’s next punt and the Raiders needed to go just 47 yards to build a three-score lead at the half. A 22yard screen pass to Paul set up Rothmeier’s 3-yard scoring run with 51 seconds left. Medford led 24-6 at halftime.

Medford’s first possession of the second half covered 84 yards in eight plays. From East’s 41-yard line, Rothmeier had one of his easiest runs of the night. The right side of the offensive line got about 6 yards of push downfield and Rothmeier had to make one man miss. He did and was able to accelerate to the end zone. Charlie Gierl stretched to make a beautiful catch in the corner of the end zone on the two-point pass for a 32-6 lead.

“He ran really, really hard,” Wilson said of Rothmeier. “He’s just decided he’s going to finish runs. That was one of his small little things last year is every once in a while he didn’t finish run. Well he’s really figured it out and he definitely works to finish every single run the best that he can. He’s really taken to coaching well on that and he’s really improved that and become much, much better.”

Medford’s next drive went 86 yards, included runs of 10, 18 and 24 by Rothmeier and ended when a well-designed play got slot receiver Sam Hierlmeier open as he curled down the left sideline on fourth and goal from the 15. Lissner dropped the ball over three defenders into Hierlmeier’s lap for the score.

“We’re not going to pass it a bunch because that’s not going our forte, but we always talk about effectiveness in the passing game,” Wilson said. “I’d say five for seven with two touchdowns is pretty effective. That’s been going well for us. We’ll see if we can expand upon that a little bit and keep moving forward with getting big plays out of that passing game.

“(The last touchdown) was a real good route by Sam,” Wilson said. “We designed that play to go that way. Sam ran it perfectly and Parker put the ball right where it needed to be put. He was a little more open than you realized if you look at on film from one side, but Parker did have to put it over four defenders and place it where it needed to be placed. It was a really well thrown ball and a really wellrun route they connected on. And he threw it on time.”

Gierl’s tip of a Davis pass gave Wilkins his interception in the middle of the field. He eluded traffic near midfield, shot through a gap and was gone to kick in the running clock.

“I saw the quarterback scramble out and I knew he was going to want to run like he’d been doing all night, getting out of the pocket,” Wilkins said. “He rolled out, Charlie Gierl tipped it, I had to make one guy miss and the rest was history.”

Now 4-0 in the GNC and officially WIAA playoff bound once again, Medford looks to keep the momentum rolling this Friday at Tomahawk in the schools’ first football meeting since 2010.

“I think we’re in a groove and things are rolling now,” Wilkins said.

“Amazing feeling, feeling amazing,” Rothmeier said.

MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS Medford’s Evan Paul makes the catch and has clear sailing to the end zone on a 36-yard touchdown pass that gets the scoring started in the Raiders’ 44-6 win Friday.