Maple Grove played an almost perfect first quarter and relied on its stubborn defense to defeat Osseo 20-0 in a Northwest Suburban Conference football game Friday, Sept. 15, at Carl Tonn Field.

"It was a great night for high school football," Maple Grove coach Craig Hansen said. "There was a huge crowd and the atmosphere was electrifying. It was a big win for us. Osseo is a very competitive team and it was a big rivalry. It was not an easy win at all."

Maple Grove got off to a great start as quarterback Ryan Koch hooked up with receiver Jake Johnson for two touchdown passes in the first quarter.

The first came early in the first quarter when Koch hit Johnson on a sideline pattern. Johnson caught the ball, eluded an Osseo tackler and ran untouched into the end zone for a 44-yard touchdown reception.

Later in the same quarter, the Crimson were driving again and had the ball on the Osseo 14. Koch called Johnson's number again, this time with a perfectly-timed slant in pat-tern. Johnson caught the ball near the goal line and powered his way in to give Maple Grove a 13-0 lead.

"Jake just made some great catches," Hansen said. "On the second one, the defender was right there but Jake just wrestled the ball away and went into the end zone."

The Crimson defense completely stymied the Orioles and took a 13-0 lead after one quarter.

"We really clicked offensively, defensively and on special team," Hansen said. "It was probably our best quarter of the season so far."

"To their credit, Maple Grove was one of the most fundamentally sound football teams that I have seen and that may have been the difference in the game," Osseo coach Claud Allaire said. "Kids just aren't born with football fundamentals; they have evidently done a great job of teaching the basics to their players."

The Osseo defense did not yield much after that first quarter, unfortunately, the Orioles offense had trouble generating any offense against the stubborn Maple Grove defense.

The Crimson finally broke through for their third touchdown in the final quarter when backup quarterback Peter Dering came in for Koch, who had lost his contacts. Dering promptly hit receiver Brent Sorbel for a 14-yard touchdown strike.

Osseo was held to 101 yards passing and 59 yards rushing while Maple Grove had 158 yards rushing and 146 passing. Johnson, who played both ways for the first time this season led the Crimson with five catches for 100 yards, Sorbel had three catches for 35 yards and Dering caught one pass for 11 yards. Koch completed eight of 15 passes for 136 yards. Fullback Josh Throndson rushed 18 times for 81 yards and Jon Hicks added 71 yards on 18 runs.

"Our two backs just played a perfect game," Hansen said. "They ran extremely hard and blocked so well for each other."

On defense, Johnson had one pass interception and broke up three passes, twin brother Jessie also intercepted one pass, rover Dan Lemke had one interception and nine tack-les and linebacker Andy Greeder added seven tackles.

"Our defense played really well and came up with some big plays," Hansen said. "The three interceptions really helped us and I thought our kicking games really helped us get good field position."

"Although our defense got better, our offense struggled," Allaire said. "Maple Grove is a good team and were very well prepared. In retrospect, we need to get back to the basics and work on our fundamentals; that was apparent on Friday night. I'm proud that our players played hard and stayed together the entire game but we just weren't prepared well enough and that will have to change. We need to get back to the basics."

Maple Grove next takes on Park Center Friday, Sept. 22, and Osseo visits Anoka.