As teams begin to enter region play, the West Forsyth Wolverines hosted the Denmark Danes, who entered Thursday night's matchup coming off back to back wins and both team sitting at 1-0 in the region standings. And while the Danes had the momentum of two straight wins, it would be the Wolverines getting off to a fast start.
After the opening drive for the game would result in Denmark punting after eight plays, West Forsyth would respond with a seven play drive capped by a 15-yard touchdown pass by senior quarterback, Max Walraven to senior tight end, Connor Willis as the Wolverines would take the early 7-0 lead.
On the ensuing Denmark possession, the Wolverines defense would make their mark early, picking off Denmark's Evan Jones on the first play of the drive, however, West Forsyth would fail to capitalize as the Asher Mote field goal attempt would push right of the upright.
The Wolverines would get another opportunity to increase their lead after receiving the ball back following another strong defensive stance which led to a three and out possession by Denmark, however the same defensive stance would see West Forsyth senior defensive tackle and offensive guard, Jack Sacchetti, suffer an injury which sidelined him for the remainder of the game.
With a chance to take a 10-7 lead, Mote would once again fail on the field goal connection and that would lead to Denmark scoring on a 50-yard touchdown pass from Evan Jones to Michael Palmieri, but it would be the Wolverines with a 10-7 at halftime as Mote would make good on a 30-yard field goal.
Similar to the start of the first half, West Forsyth would open up the third quarter scoring on their first possession as Walraven would connect with Mason Page who would score on a 64-yard touchdown helping the Wolverines take a 17-7 lead. And while the Danes would respond with a field goal to get back within seven of the Wolverines, a late interception thrown by Jones would result in a pick six by Page as West Forsyth would go on to win by a final of 24-10.
"Tonight's win was really important," West Forsyth head coach, Dave Svehla, said after Thursday's win, crediting Denmark for their competitiveness. Denmark is a really well coached football team and they play hard and we knew that," Svehla said, acknowledging the mistakes his team made throughout the night which could have led to Denmark getting the win.
"We shot ourselves in the foot over and over and over again, but I told our guys, I was proud of the way we still continued to play and we kind of recovered quite a bit," Svehla said, noting the singe punt the Wolverines had throughout the night. "But way too many penalties, just too sloppy, but we beat a good football team and to your point, we're 2-0 in the region and that's what we were hoping we would be at the end of tonight," Svehla added.