Cyclone FB Wins Aerial Show Over Glenwood, 38-22

Harlan Community's Gabe Arkfeld (9-13-24)

Cyclone FB Wins Aerial Show Over Glenwood, 38-22 -

(9-13-24) – The aerial attack was on display for the Cyclones Friday.

Harlan Community had a career outing from quarterback Gabe Arkfeld who threw for 266 yards and 5 touchdowns in a 38-22 win over Glenwood.

Cyclone Coach Todd Bladt liked seeing the passing open up, but also felt there were some issues to fix on both sides of the ball.

“Hey, any wins a win and we're going to take that,” Bladt told KNOD Sports after the game. “We had some ugly things happen out there and just some things that we got to work on football-wise, you know, football knowledge-wise, situationally. We got to put the guys into this situation so they can react to it better.”

The Cyclones scored on their opening drive of the game on a 36-yard shove pass to Lukas Francis. But both teams would step up on defense stopping each other on downs for three of the next five drives. Harlan Community would go up two scores early in the 2nd quarter after Arkfeld hooked up with Joseph Reisz to end a 9-play, 70-yard drive.

Arkfeld felt his management of the game was a lot better than his two previous starts.

“First couple games I felt like I wasn't quite locked in all the way. This game I felt like I was doing a lot better. Trusted everybody. Everybody was just on my side.”

“He stepped up and made some really, really nice throws tonight,” said Bladt of his junior QB.

A defensive breakdown allowed Glenwood to score with 4:14 left in the first half when Cole Staudt found Kaden Crouch for a 70-yard TD and cut the Rams deficit in half. It would be the start of Glenwood exploiting the Cyclone secondary for 286 yards passing.

The Rams tried to rally late, but a big sack by Shane Cooper late in the 4th sealed the game.

Reisz caught four of Arkfeld’s touchdown passes and had 140 yards on the evening. Bladt feels Reisz’s size and strength make him a very special player.

“Joseph’s a big man out there. He really is. He's a big target and I know one time we throw a little quick out to him and they got two guys on him. I'm going, ‘Oh boy. I don't know if I like this very much.’ And I should shut my mouth because about two seconds later we got 15 yards.”

“Joseph he just got everything I threw to him,” said Arkfeld. “It was really easy target out there. He was just making himself get open.”

Despite struggles with the running game, Francis was still able to manage 119 yards total offense and a touchdown, continuing his stellar play this year.

Bladt knows that having balance on offense will be important for his team moving forward.

“People start scouting. People watch film. They're not dumb. You know, when they see us running the ball for couple of 300 yards or whatever it was last week against Denison and ran the ball pretty efficiently against Lewis Central in Week 1, maybe they said, ‘Hey. We're going to stop the run, you know, let's make them beat us with the pass.’

“There's definitely room for improvement, but when somebody takes something away, you have to be able to be versatile and then move on to whatever phase is next in the game.”

Harlan Community will continue that improvement when the play on the road against Sergeant Bluff-Luton on Friday.

View past scores by visiting the Iowa High School Athletic Association's website, Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union website,
or Iowa Quik Stats