Vandals Pick Up 3rd Win After Rout of Lakers

The Eureka Vandals football team might are rolling at present after picking up their third straight win, a 40-8 romp at Pyramid Lake last week.

The teams have only played a few times since 2004 and the Vandals had a 5-0 mark going into the game.

The boys upped that record to 6-0 with the victory.

Sophomore quarterback Clayton Shoda was a one-man wrecking crew. He rushed for 151 yards and three touchdowns, and was 8-of-14 passing for 198 yards and two more touchdowns, a career high of 349 yards individually.

Eureka amassed 405 yards in offense against the outmatched Lakers.

Vandals coach Fred Minoletti said Pyramid Lake was focusing on “stopping our inside power run game and they did a good job in that regard, limiting Gage Howard to nine yards on seven carries. They were pretty scrappy in that respect with some big kids on the front line, but that opened up the outside,” he said. “So we made adjustments, did some sweeps, flanker passes, and Shota did well on a couple of long runs off the quarterback draw.”

Sophomore Gavin Bowling had only two receptions, but accounted for 76 yards and one touchdown. Shota also connected on a 50-yard scoring strike to Jake Baumann.

Minoletti said the Vandals jumped out to a quick 14-0 lead, scoring on their first drive, “then Chase Green recovered a Pyramid Lake fumble and took it back about 20 yards for our second score. We just kept it up on them throughout the night, a 26-0 halftime lead, and Pyramid Lake did not score until the fourth quarter against our second string players.”

Ashton Sanders and Chris Drayton did well on the defensive side for the Vandals. Sanders had five solo tackles and Drayton with four.

This week, the Vandals (3-1) begin league play starting at Carlin (2-2) on Friday.

The Vandals are the two-time defending champions of the 1A east league.

McDermitt, which had been in the league the past few years, apparently is not playing football this year leaving just five teams in the east league.