Indians in Giving Mood with Friday's Season-Opening Loss to Morris

This is the 100th year of Morris High School football and Minooka was in a giving mood during their season-opening, nonconference tilt Friday in Morris.

Morris took advantage of a half dozen critical mistakes to post a 27-21 victory in a battle of former Suburban Prairie and Southwest Prairie conference foes.

Minooka (0-1) committed five turnovers and gave up a pair of long returns that set up first-half scores for Morris (1-0).

“I feel bad for our kids because this was a pretty important game for our kids and our community,” Minooka coach Bert Kooi said.

After Luke Stovall caught a 25-yard touchdown pass from Joe Carnagio to give Minooka a 7-0 lead with 5:40 left in the first quarter, Morris scored 20 straight points over the next eight minutes.

Danny Friend caught an 18-yard touchdown pass from Feeney, tying the game at 7-all with 1:29 to play in the first quarter. Nik Countryman’s 59-yard return of a blocked punt set up a 1-yard plunge by Feeney, which gave the Redskins the lead for good at 14-7
with 9:18 left in the second.

Minooka mishandled a lateral pass and Friend picked it up and scampered to the Minooka 9, setting up another score and a 20-7 lead at the half.

A 3-yard touchdown run by Kalvin Hill (16 carries, 117 yards, two touchdowns) with 3:59 to play in the third quarter shaved the lead to 20-14.

Morris’ Jake Hogen returned a fumbled punt 15 yards for a touchdown, which bumped the lead to 27-14 lead with 8:04 to play in the game.

Hill’s 2-yard touchdown cut the lead to 27-20 with 3:14 to go in the game.

Minooka held and got the ball back at its own 43 with 2:08 to play in the game. However, two plays later, it turned it over again and Countryman’s recovery sealed it.