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Onalaska coach Mazen Saade talks about it every single day. He has since the start of practice in August.
“It comes down to the little things,” Saade said.
The No. 6 Loggers failed to do the little things in a Round of 16 matchup against No. 11 Liberty Bell in Onalaska on Saturday, and the Loggers were defeated 40-38 in a season-ending loss.
“Too many little things add up to big things,” Saade said. “Today, they bit us in the butt.”
Onalaska got going early, building a 20-8 lead at halftime, but the Liberty Bell offense got going in the second half.
The Mountain Lions scored 24 points in the third and added another early in the fourth to take a 40-26 lead.
Onalaska didn’t lie down. Ethan Thayer scored to make it a one-possession game, and with 29 seconds left, Lane Gordon hit Eli Srnka on an 8-yard pass to get within two. The ensuing two-point try was no good, though. It was the fifth failed two-point attempt of the game.
“You have to be able to convert on two-point conversions,” Saade said. “We were unable to do that today.”
In addition to the struggles on two-point tries, the Loggers also committed a whopping 20 penalties.
“Blocking and tackling is at the root of this game,” Saade said. “When you commit penalties doing that, it comes back to bite you … Our mental focus wasn’t there.”
The penalties and dry spell on the conversion attempts were enough to down the Loggers despite the fact that they ran for 515 yards as a team.
Thayer finished with 238 yards and a touchdown, Haze Hamrick added 201 yards and three scores, and Carson Albertson finished with 52 yards and a touchdown of his own.
“Hats off to Liberty Bell,” Saade said. “I wanna take no credit from them … We made a lot of mental mistakes today, and those are things we’ll have the entire offseason to fix and think about.”
The Loggers finish their season 7-4 and will graduate two seniors: Steven Gomes and Will Zandell.
