Lake City escapes against rival

Both the Lake City and Coeur d’Alene football teams did all they could to give each other the game Friday.

Seriously. More on that later.

In the end, the No. 1-ranked Timberwolves held off No. 5 Coeur d’Alene 21-18 in a 5A Inland Empire League opener before an estimated standing-room-only crowd of 5,000 at Viking Field.

The 20th game in the series may go down as one of the poorest played.

Lake City coach Van Troxel felt his team was fortunate to escape with a victory. He held a 10-minute postgame talk with his team on the field, and he criticized all involved – from the coaches to the players.

It appeared LC (5-0) had all but clinched the win when the T-Wolves went ahead 21-6 on an 18-yard touchdown run by B.J. Palmer with 10 minutes remaining.

But the Vikings (4-2), who to their credit didn’t stop playing hard, used a 40-yard interception return by Calvin Peterson for one touchdown and a 35-yard TD bomb from Shea Vucinich to Jake Rhodes to pull within the final margin with 2:17 to go.

The ensuing onside kick was illegally touched early by a Viking, allowing LC to take over at CdA’s 47-yard line. The clinching play for LC came when quarterback Garren Hammons picked up 8 yards on a keeper for a first down after the Vikings had used their final time out.

Hammons, who rushed for a game-high 138 yards and threw for 106, went to his knee three straight times, allowing the clock to expire and his team to dodge an upset.

“It was not a pretty football game by any means,” Troxel said. “We did everything to ourselves. We caused all of our own problems.”

LC, coming off a bye, had 21 penalties, not including the mental gaffes.

“Coeur d’Alene is a very, very good football team. We are fortunate to get out of here alive because they’re dangerous … ,” Troxel said.