After a win last weekend against Apple Valley, Park was ready to battle Robinsdale Cooper. Under the Friday night lights, the Orioles hosted Cooper for their homecoming football game on Sept. 20. Park suffered a loss against Cooper, resulting in a 0-41 score.
Sophomore Finn Brooberg said the team has plays they can improve on as a whole. He said they will continue to focus and tweak tactics in the coming weeks.
“We did pretty good, but as a team, we have a lot of stuff to work on this week at practice,” Brooberg said. “We definitely have many different things we need to change.”
According to assistant coach Alexander Polk, the team must practice tackling and not be timid about it. He said they must switch from constantly playing defense to offense in games.
“We’ve got to be able to tackle better, and we’ve got to be able to turn the ball over, and by that, we need to force them to turn the ball over more,” Polk said.
Senior captain Jeremy Eichten said Cooper was a competitive team, which was difficult to play up to. He said the team struggled in the game and didn’t play their best.
“We really struggled against this team. I know that it was a good team that we played, but we need to be better, and we did not play to the best of our ability,” Eichten said.
According to Brooberg, the offense needs to start playing as one. He said the team is well-rounded, and they must work together.
“For scoring touchdowns, we have to have everybody on our offense doing their job—that’s the only way we can start scoring more,” Brooberg said. “Everyone on our team is good and skillful, but we’re just not working together well enough.”
Eichten said this being his last homecoming game was an unknown sensation. He said having the community attend the game and cheer the team on felt good.
“It’s a really weird feeling this being my last homecoming game because knowing that you don’t have any of these big games left is hard to sink in, especially when you lose,” Eichten said. “It was good to have the whole student section and city come out to support.”
Polk said it was enjoyable to have everyone show up and rally the players. Even though Park might not have performed as expected the support was still appreciated.
“It was good to have the students and everyone come out to support the team. Even though we didn’t perform as we would have liked, it was still nice to have their energy there,” Polk said.
Brooberg said the louder the student section, the better the team plays. He said the excitement from the fans gives the team a boost of energy.
“The crowd on homecoming brought so much needed energy to our team,” Brooberg said. “The more people show up and cheer us on from the stands, the better we play.”
According to Eichten, the energy from the student section encourages the players and pushes them through the game. He said he hopes the fans will keep coming out and supporting the players.
“The student section definitely helps because they’re backing us up supporting us throughout the game, and that definitely adds fuel to what we’re trying to do,” Eichten said. “Unfortunately, that didn’t really show during this game, but hopefully, in future weeks the student section will still come out and support, and we’ll be able to capitalize on that and use that.”
Park’s next game is against the Jefferson Jaguars at 7:00 p.m. Sept. 27. at Bloomington Jefferson.
