By Noah Dalton
MITCHELL — After the tough loss in last week’s home opener, Mitchell High School looked to bounce back on Friday, when the team travelled to French Lick for a Patoka Lake Athletic Conference battle against Springs Valley.
In their first PLAC game of the season, the Bluejackets offense showed vast improvement from the previous week, but it ultimately wasn’t enough to beat the Blackhawks, who ultimately won the game, 64-24.
Springs Valley dominated the early stages of the game, capitalizing on Mitchell’s miscues, namely four turnovers in the half, to begin drives with good field position and put points on the board.
The Blackhawks led 64-8 at the half, with the Bluejackets’ lone first-half touchdown coming via an 82-yard touchdown pass from Kaden Mullis to receiver Sven Lutchka.
Mitchell head coach Bobby Owens said the team’s mistakes in the first half, as well as some injuries, allowed Springs Valley to take control early.
“We had a couple of crucial injuries within that first drive. On the first offensive possession, our quarterback, who is also our starting middle linebacker, got his knee twisted, so he didn’t play defense in the whole first half,” said Owens.
“We were banged up throughout the game, but we had others step in and fill roles that they haven’t even played, and we got them coached up and kept the momentum going.”
The Bluejackets turned things around in the second half, though it was not enough to mount a comeback with the size of the Blackhawk’s’ first-half lead, which led to a running clock for the remainder of the game.
Mitchell outscored Springs Valley 16-0 in the second half, racking up 163 yards of total offense and forcing two turnovers on defense.
Despite some longer drives in the first half, the Bluejackets only found the end zone one time, compared to two touchdowns in three possessions in the second half, shorted by the running clock.
Owens attributed the improvement to cutting down on previous mistakes, which helped them maintain momentum and retain possession of the ball.
“It was momentum, and we executed, and we didn’t do anything to hurt ourselves, and we just kept control of the ball,” he said. “It was there all game long, like I said, because we would hit it for 30, 40 yards. We just couldn’t put it together to go 80 yards, and that’s the key to high school football on both sides.”
Mullis led the offense for Mitchell, throwing for 191 yards across 18 completions with one touchdown.
Lutchka was his top target, picking up 104 yards in three catches. Tajay Alexander, who caught 7 passes for 49 yards and Jaredon Sowder, who caught five passes for 33 yards also got in on the action.
The offensive was also aided by running back Kelan Endris, who ran for 89 yards in 11 tries, finding the end zone once in the second half.
The Blackhawks success was largely earned through their running game, as they combined for 273 yards on the ground and eight touchdowns.
Next for Mitchell is another PLAC matchup on the road, this time against West Washington.
“We’re going to keep building on the success that we had, especially in this second half,” Owens said.
“The coaching staff is going to hit film hard this week. I think we had a good game plan today too, we just couldn’t make the tackle whenever we were in the spot and we had a few blunders on offense, but I think we’ll clean it up next week and we’ll use the momentum and we’ll move forward.”
