Van Kempen’s four TDs propel Saints past Cougars, into playoffs

Mountain View’s Trevor Van Kempen wasn’t looking for another team to help the Saints get into the playoffs.

So the senior quarterback took care of things himself.

Van Kempen rushed for 118 yards and four touchdowns Thursday to lead Mountain View to a 54-12 home victory over Laughlin that secured a postseason berth for the Saints.

“This game was like a must-win, because we wanted to make sure we got ourselves in the playoffs and don’t let anyone else do it,” Van Kempen said. “We just capitalized on every big play that we had. We just kept them coming and never really gave up.”

The Saints (6-4, 5-2 2A Southern League) could have made the playoffs without a win, but would have had to count on the outcome of another game to secure the spot.

Instead they came out and dominated from the start, racking up 513 yards of offense, including six plays of 20 or more yards.

Van Kempen scored on TD runs of 3 yards, 38 yards, 1 yard and 14 yards. The senior quarterback also passed for 184 yards.

Though he didn’t pass for a touchdown, he set up a pair of TDs with long passes. Van Kempen hit Matthew Larson with a 79-yard pass to set up his own 1-yard run, and connected with Noah Grunendike on a 45-yard pass that set up a 9-yard TD run by Elijah Armstrong.

“This is good just for confidence,” Van Kempen said. “We just needed to come out and get everything we needed to show ourselves how good we could possibly be. It was a good game to get everything going and just see our offense really work.”

Jacob Duldulao ran for 103 yards on six carries, including TD runs of 65 and 25 yards in the first half.
Armstrong also had a 15-yard TD run for Mountain View.

Laughlin’s Corey Beggs completed a 13-yard scoring pass to Jake Hodges and also had a 28-yard TD run.

But the Cougars (5-4, 3-4) never got their offense going. Mountain View limited Laughlin to 11 yards of offense in the first half, and 143 total yards.

“We just came in and stressed how they were a power game and we just had to meet them in the hole,” said Van Kempen, who also recorded a sack on defense. “We just gang-tackled and didn’t let them get much in the first half.”

Reece Bowman intercepted a pair of passes for the Saints, who earned the Southern League’s No. 3 playoff seed.