Cardinals Roll and Falcons Face Hot Opponent

The defending Section One Class A Champion Faribault Bethlehem Academy Cardinals have learned how to step their play up come playoff time.  Tuesday night they hosted a athletic Southland Rebel team and defeated them 47-17 to advance to Saturday's semi-final at #1 seed Rushford-Peterson.  On the other side of the bracket Blooming Prairie crushed Fillmore Central 60-13 and Goodhue beat Wabasha-Kellogg 35-20 meaning the Wildcats of Goodhue head to Awesome Blossom country Saturday night on KAT Kountry 105.  The Faribault Falcons will play a very hot Rochester John Marshall Rocket team that is bristling with confidence after knocking off Class  5A top ranked Mankato West in the regular season final,  they went to Rochester Century a angry #5 seed and rolled to a 42-21 victory.  They'll be in Faribault Saturday night with a 7pm kickoff on POWER 96 radio.  On the other side of the bracket Owatonna got by Austin 24 to 16 and heads to Rochester Mayo Saturday night on KRFO Radio.  The Faribault Falcons lost to John Marshall in the first game of the season at the end of August.  Faribault totally dominated the first half and had the game called due to lightning ahead 6-0 with some time left on the clock before halftime.  Faribault jumped on the bus on a Friday night and headed back to Rochester the next day only to see JM tie the game right before the half.  it was tied at 14 heading into the 4th quarter before JM picked off a pass and scored and added two more scores.  The Falcons had other chances to score in that dominating first half and some of the coaches said JM is who they wanted to see in the playoffs.  It's almost like looking in the mirror.  Both teams run the football to set up some play action passing offensively and play the run very well.  Faribault was without the services of Senior quarterback Danny Ehlers and he definitely brings a different dimension to the Falcon offense, but you know the old adage "defense wins championships."

      Rocket Stadium in August