Photo courtesy of Troy L. Hugen Photography

The Pella Christian football team struggled to finish drives in their season opener Friday, falling 32-13 to Roland-Story in a game heard live on 92.1 KRLS.

The Eagles opened the game strong, with Brecken Ritzert running the opening play 68-yards for a first play score to give the Eagles a 7-0 lead. Ritzert then stopped Roland-Story’s opening drive with a fourth down interception, but the Norsemen took control of the game from there. After Pella Christian’s second drive stalled out Roland-Story scored 32 unanswered points and racked up 602 yards of total offense to put the game out of reach. The Eagles added a score late in the contest, when Ritzert connected with Caleb Volk for a 32-yard touchdown pass, but it wasn’t enough to avoid falling to 0-1 on the season. Pella Christian had 311 yards of total offense and made four trips to the red zone in the game, but were unable to score on all four drives. Head coach Rich Kacmarynski said that the difference in the game was the battle in the trenches.

“They really controlled the line of scrimmage, which allowed them to control the ball game and control the ball. So, we got to get better on both sides of the line of scrimmage. I thought offensively, we really struggled to finish our blocks. I thought we had some good contact, but we did not get good movement to finish blocks, and then defensively, we’ve got to play better with our hands and we’ve got to get off blocks better and rally to the ball.”

The Eagles will look to bounce back next Friday, competing on the road against long-time rival Pleasantville at 7 pm.