Last Friday, September 6th, the Westside varsity football team hosted the Papillion-La Vista Monarchs. The Warriors came into the week fresh off a game one win against the Bellevue East Chieftains and jumped into the number three spot in the Class A rankings. The Monarchs, however, came off a week one loss to their biggest rival in Papillion-La Vista South and were trying to get their first win on the year.

Out of the gate, neither offense could get much going. Both teams punted on their first drives leaving the Monarchs with the ball with just above five minutes left in the first. Papillion-La Vista then marched down the field 75 yards for an early touchdown to end the quarter. That lead would be taken away quickly. On the kickoff sophomore Jack Wimmer would take it 91 yards to the house to get the Warriors on the board. Jack didn’t seem to overthink the return.

“While it was happening I didn’t really have too many thoughts,” Wimmer said. “I just thought, ‘find the hole and run.’”

Less than three minutes later, after a Monarch punt, junior Cole Payton launched a 69 yard touchdown pass to Jake Holmstrom to put the Warriors up 14-7. The two teams then traded touchdowns and the Warriors went into half up 21-14, still too close for comfort. Head Coach Brett Froendt wasn’t too happy with the physicality shown in the first half.

“They came out more physical than us and they hit us in the mouth pretty hard and they sustained that,” Froendt said.
Coming out of the locker room the Warriors didn’t look back from that first half. After a failed onside kick attempt by the Monarchs, the Warrior offense drove down the field and put up 7 on the board with a touchdown pass to junior Avante Dickerson. The Warriors would go on to score another 20 unanswered points throughout the rest of the game and send the Monarchs home by a score of 48-14. Junior Quarterback Cole Payton said what it meant to get the week two home win.

“The crowd atmosphere helps a lot,” Payton said. “We have the best fans in the state and it brings more and more energy.”

The Warriors this Friday will head down to Lincoln to play the number 5 ranked Knights of Lincoln Southeast. The run heavy Knight offense will try to sneak by the high powered Warrior defense and get a home win while the Warriors will look to get themselves to 3-0.