Airedales bark; Cards don’t fold

CAMDEN — Alma put a scare into Camden Fairview on Friday, but couldn’t knock off the Cardinals, who won 42-28 in the quarterfinals of the Class 5A playoffs.

Although the Airedales trailed from the start, they pulled within 28-21 with 5:58 to play in the third quarter on a 6-yard touchdown pass from Gage Jensen to Harrison Newton, then drove to the Camden Fairview 14 with a chance to tie.

Keontay Purifoy intercepted their chances in the end zone, and an 80-yard pass from Matthew Ollison to Brandon Hoof put the Cardinals back up by two scores.

Although Alma threw another end zone interception on its next drive, this time to Markell Jones, the Airedales pulled within a touchdown again with 7:25 to play when Jensen scored on a 20-yard run.

Camden Fairview responded with an eightplay 66-yard drive to finish off the Airedales, with Ollison throwing a 6-yard touchdown pass to Hoof with 3:45 left.

Ollison finished 16 of 27 for 260 yards and 4 touchdowns. Hoof had seven catches for 130 yards, while Deion Hollimon had 7 catches for 127 yards and a touchdown.

Hollimon had the Cardinals’ first touchdown catch, a 35-yard pass from Ollison as Camden Fairview scored twice in the first seven minutes. The other score came on a 3-yard pass from Ollison to Jerry Moorehead.

Alma cut the lead to 14-7 behind a 3-yard touchdown pass from Jensen to Gage Battles, but an 87-yard touchdown run by Jamie Smith put the Cardinals back up by 14. Smith finished with 117 yards rushing on 10 carries.

The back and forth continued with Jensen throwing a 3-yard touchdown pass to Colton Battles to cut the lead to 21-14 and Darius Fletcher scoring on a 58-yard run to push the lead to 28-14. A defensive stand by Camden Fairview allowed the Cardinals to go into halftime with that lead.

Fletcher finished with 111 yards on seven carries.

Jensen, who completed 25 of 47 passes and threw 2 touchdown passes and 2 interceptions, rushed 31 times for 143 yards as Alma totaled 508 yards (286 rushing and 222 passing) and 28 first downs, compared to 478 yards and 10 first downs for Camden Fairview.