Tigers stumble during 7-21 loss against Nampa

After snapping a 26-game losing streak the week before with their win at Caldwell, the Mountain Home Tigers were hoping to make it two straight by downing Nampa Friday night at Tiger Field in Mountain Home.

While they had numerous chances, the Tigers let this one get away from them as the Bulldogs left with their second straight win, a 21-7 victory over Mountain Home.

Mountain Home received the ball to start the ball game, but went three-and-out and punted the ball to the Bulldogs.

The Tigers' punt had Nampa starting deep in its own territory, on their own nine yard-line. Three plays later, Brandon Forsberg rolled out to his left and found daylight and rushed 85 yards for a score. With the point-after try, the Bulldogs led by seven with 9:24 left in the first quarter.

The two teams exchanged punts after that and on Nampa's second punt the Tigers started in Bulldog territory at the Nampa 28 after the punt was blocked.

Mountain Home picked up a first down at the Bulldog 12 and on fourth and three at the Nampa five, then turned the ball over on downs at the Bulldog 13-yard line.

The defenses controlled the game the rest of the half until late in the half, when the Bulldogs put together a seven-play, 59-yard drive, Keenan Wilcox finding a hole and spurting 37 yards for a score. With the PAT, the Bulldogs took a 14-0 lead into the locker room at halftime.

After forcing Nampa to punt the ball on their opening drive of the third quarter, Mountain Home fumbled the ball back to the Bulldogs on the Tiger 32-yard line. A holding penalty and a quarterback sack killed the Nampa drive and they punted the ball back to the Tigers.

Mountain Home again turned the ball over by fumbling and the Bulldogs had it at the Tiger 35.

This time the Bulldogs capitalized, going the 35 yards in five plays, Nathaniel Vallejo taking it in from five yards out, as Nampa increased their lead to 21-0, with four minutes left in the third quarter.

Mountain Home finally got their offense clicking behind the running of Ryan Eckstrom, and the Tigers went 85 yards in eight plays, Eckstrom taking it in from two yards out. Jiame Martinez booted the PAT to make it 21-7 with 1:11 left in the third quarter.

The Tigers forced a punt and moved the ball down to the Nampa 25 before turning it over on downs.

Again, the Tigers forced a Nampa punt. Ryan Eckstrom took the punt on the run and returned it into Nampa territory, but fumbled the ball, the Bulldogs recovering it on their 45.

Mountain Home got the ball back when Jake Ryan intercepted a Nampa pass and returns it to the Bulldog 47.

The Tigers moved the ball down to the Nampa 21 but turned it over on downs at the Bulldog 29.

Nampa started from there with 2:13 left and the Tiger defense forced a punt.

Mountain Home started from their own 36 with 1:01 left in the game. They are able to get into Nampa territory to the Bulldog 40, but time ran out before they coould score.

Tiger head football coach Aaron Rodney was disappointed in the loss.

"There are a lot of people who are content in being mediocre -- they like mediocrity. A lot of the kids -- we didn't show up to play until the third quarter -- they played scared. The mental mistakes killed us again.

"We haven't lost to a better team all year. At some point, we're going to have to clean that up. We go into the red zone and come away with nothing because we make stupid mistakes, and those are the things that we have to fix to get better."

Mountain Home rushed the ball 40 times for 144 yards, with Ryan Eckstrom getting most of those, 118 yards and a touchdown, on 21 rushes. Jesse Cobos rushed 11 times for 12 yards, Justin Lawrence carried three times for 10 yards and Jordan Pendleton ran three times for four yards.

Jesse Cobos completed 12 of 25 passes for 86 yards.

Nigel Whitfield caught seven passes for 56 yards, Michael Knapp had three catches for 23 yards, Jordan Pendleton had one reception for six yards and Pete Ramadan caught one for one yard.

The loss drops the Tigers to 1-5 on the season and 1-4 in conference. They host Bishop Kelly this Friday night for Senior Night.

"Bishop Kelly's going to be physical and try and run it down your throat," said Coach Rodney of the Knights.

"It's Senior Night, so hopefully we'll have some emotion and we'll try to get after them. They're definitely beatable. If we play to our potential we can beat 'em. There's no question, we can get after them -- and we're going to. We're not going to quit. We'll keep going and keep grinding.

"Hopefully we can heal some people -- you know that's part of it -- we were missing three keys players tonight (in the Nampa game), which would have helped us, but we can't make those excuses. It is what it is, but at this point of the season everyone's got kids hurt and you've got to play to your potential and try to overcome those things."

Kickoff is set for 7 p.m. Friday at Tiger Field with the senior players set to be honored before the game.