Paul Peterson photo Houghton quarterback George Butvilas gets off a pass as Nevan Ketchum, 40, of West Iron County pursues on the play. The Wykons came away with 7-0 win at Alumni Field.

HOUGHTON — If the West Iron Wykons were expecting an easy football game with the Houghton Gremlins Friday night, they came away disappointed.

But well-regarded WIC still notched with a hard-earned 7-0 West-PAC win at Alumni Field.

“I don’t think we were expecting an easy game,” Wykons coach Mike Berutti said afterward. “But they (Gremlins) came out to play football tonight. My hat’s off to them and to (coach) Frank Bonacorsi for a great effort.”

Just as they did last week versus Calumet, the Orange and Black went to-to-toe with a bigger foe last night.

But the end result was a defeat — Houghton’s fourth in a row this fall.

Bonacorsi, while proud of his team, said an early fumble at the WIC 2 in the opening quarter was a killer.

“That play really hurt us,” Bonacorsi noted. “We worked to get into the red zone and had a first-and-goal there.

“It’s one of those things we have to work on.”

As it turned out, the only score of the hard-hitting contest came with just eight seconds remaining in the opening half.

After forcing a Gremlin punt with 1:12 left, the visitors received a nice punt return by Austin Guiliani that brought the ball inside the Houghton 30-yard line.

Senior quarterback Neil Tomasoski , who did much of the damage on the drive, snuck in from a yard out for the score. The PAT kick was good by Zach Quintero.

Houghton began the second half strongly, driving inside the WIC 15 to begin the half.

A pair of 12-yard scrambles by junior QB George Butvilas on fourth-and-long plays were the big keys in the drive.

But a holding penalty put a damper on the threat, which ended when the locals ran out of downs.

“We did hurt ourselves with a few bad penalties,” Bonacorsi commented. “Again, that’s something we have to improve on.”

The hard running of sophomore Ty Halonen and senior Jake Rajala helped keep the ball away from the Wykons for most of the second half. 

Halonen led HHS rushers with 76 yards in 12 carries, while Rajala was good for 65 in 15 tries. Both were outstanding on defense as well, recording double figures in tackles.

Bonacorsi, whose team hosts Northland Pines on Friday, said he was encouraged by the drives his team put together.

“We had better drives than we did last week against Calumet,” he pointed out. “But we’ll keep working. This is a great group of young men and I’m hoping we can get them a win this season. The record doesn’t show what we’re capable of right now.”

Josh Nelson did the bulk of the damage for WIC, which played without its big fullback Jayce Brockhagen.

West Iron 0 7 0 0 – 7

Houghton 0 0 0 0 – 0

Second quarter

WI – Neil Tomasoski 1 run (Zach Quintero kick)

Game stats

Rushing: WIC 42-211; HO 33-133; Ind. Rushers: WIC: Nelson 21-77, Tomasoski 15-45; HO: Halonen 12-76; Rajala 15-65.