When Memorial\u2019s varsity football team took the field for their last regular season game against Madison La Follette, there was little doubt that the Spartans would secure the win against the Lancers to finish the season at 4-5 overall and 4-3 in conference play. But that wouldn\u2019t be enough to earn a spot in the WIAA D1 playoffs this year, and VPM needed a lot of help to make it. Of the three other games that needed to fall the right way for a playoff bid, two went in Memorial\u2019s favor – Ashwaubenon beat Green Bay Preble, and Marshfield beat Stevens Point – but Menominee suffered a blowout loss to Chippewa Falls, 36-6, which meant Memorial would miss the playoffs for the first time in many years.<\/p>\n
Overall, the season was consistent, but only if you split it in two. The Spartans started out 0-5, losing a close season opener to Whitefish Bay 27-22, getting shut out by Waunakee, who last year suffered an upset loss to Memorial, and losing to Middleton, Verona, and perhaps worst of all, Madison West. The West loss was particularly bad because it was the Spartans\u2019 last hope of maintaining a winning record and making the playoffs. And in the end, had they won, Memorial would\u2019ve finished 5-4 on the year. What made matters worse was the fact that West only won in overtime (college rules) after Memorial QB Blake Adams threw an interception on a must-score drive.<\/p>\n
The second half of the season featured much weaker opponents, and accordingly, much stronger performances by the Spartans. In the final four games against Madison East, Janesville Craig and Parker, and Madison La Follette, Memorial put up a whopping 176 combined points and allowed just 33 combined points on defense, with a shutout against East. The passing game improved a bit in the final stretch, but what really took off was the running game, starring RB AJ Danso, who made the Madison All-City team this year.<\/p>\n
West (#8) lost in the first round of the playoffs to #1 seed Muskego this past week, and both Verona and Middleton went on to the second round of play, which will take place Friday night. As for major questions to answer for the Spartans next season, the role of starting quarterback will once again change with Blake Adams graduating, likely going to junior Bryan Hinkle. Several other key positions will shift, with several key receivers and linemen graduating as well.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When Memorial\u2019s varsity football team took the field for their last regular season game against Madison La Follette, there was little doubt that the Spartans would secure the win against the Lancers to finish the season at 4-5 overall and 4-3 in conference play. But that wouldn\u2019t be enough to earn a spot in the…<\/p>","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":4457,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,104],"tags":[303],"staff_name":[226],"class_list":["post-4455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","category-vpm-sports","tag-november-25","staff_name-henry-riley"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4455"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4455\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4459,"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4455\/revisions\/4459"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4457"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4455"},{"taxonomy":"staff_name","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/memorialswordandshield.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/staff_name?post=4455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}