The Owatonna football team wasn’t about to let history repeat itself.

Not on Friday night, not against this team.

Despite allowing a gut-punching third-and-long conversion and yielding a touchdown on the game’s opening drive against New Prague for the second consecutive season, the Huskies remained composed, regrouped at halftime and eventually kicked things into high gear in the second half to earn a pivotal 17-7 Northstar District-Maroon victory at Federated Field on Friday night.

“They were a little frustrated at the half,” Owatonna coach Jeff Williams said moments after the game. “But we went into the break, put a little mouthwash in and came out in the second half and took care of business.”

Added Caleb Hullopeter: “Honestly, I think we were a little down on ourselves for not putting up as many points as we wanted to in the first half. But we knew we could come out in the second half and put up the points we needed to win the game, and that’s exactly what we did.”

The win gives Owatonna (2-1 overall, 1-0 Northstar Maroon) the early edge in the race for District and Section 1-AAAAA supremacy and snaps a two-game losing streak against the No. 7-ranked Trojans (2-1, 0-1).

“It’s a long season,” Williams said. “It’s a marathon. It’s nice to be able to get back up onto the horse. We have a tough game against Northfield at their place next week, so we aren’t going to be able to enjoy this one for very long. But it’s a section game and that’s big from a seeding standpoint. Big for homefield. Big for giving the guys some extra rest over MEA. Just a big performance by the guys tonight.”

Owatonna — which trailed 7-0 less than four minutes into the game after New Prague converted a 56-yard touchdown pass on third-and-18 on a broken play — was led by Caleb Hullopeter’s two touchdown receptions and spearheaded on the other side of the ball by a gnarly defense that forced three turnovers, collected two sacks and contained the Trojans’ typically-productive ground attack.

Hullopeter’s powerful 47-yard catch-and-run late in the third quarter ultimately served as the game-deciding score in a contest that Owatonna trailed 7-3 at halftime. The senior needed just three total grabs to rack up a team-best 97 receiving yards, adding a 33-yard insurance touchdown with 9:08 on the clock in the fourth quarter on a perfectly spun fade from teammate Jacob Ginskey.

Through three games, Hullopeter — who also broke free for a 37-yard rush in the second half against the Trojans — leads the ultra-stacked Owatonna receiver corps with four touchdown grabs to go with 13 receptions and 237 yards.

“Caleb and I had a deal going last winter where we would DM each other on Twitter when we saw a good individual route being run,” Williams said. “Not schemes, not concepts, but just a guy who executes well and makes the defender drops his shorts a little bit. I think he really takes pride in his ability to run crisp routes.”

Though he threw his first interception of the season and lost a fumble, Ginskey more than made up for it with an ultra-effective performance through the air, ending 12-for-18 (66%) to go with 220 yards and two touchdowns.

Owatonna’s defense buckled down after surrendering a touchdown on the game-opening drive and permitted New Prague to march past midfield just once in the game’s final three quarters and surrendered less than 45 rushing yards all game.

OHS junior linebacker Blake Fitcher picked off one pass while Brennan Sletten rang up one sack and forced a fumble. Blake Davison led the team with nine tackles, recovered a fumble and came up with key pass deflection late in the second half.

“I think that hurt them a little bit,” Williams said of the Trojans’ inability to run the ball effectively. “Because then they had to dink and dunk a little bit. Not to say they didn’t get the ball down the field, because they did that a few times on us. They had some trickeration to get vertical on us, but they prefer play-action and the underneath stuff, and that is harder to get going when you can’t consistently run the ball. We did a nice job tonight shutting them down (on the ground).”

Owatonna’s first touchdown-scoring drive started with 2:53 left on the clock in the third quarter and was aided by a 35-yard bomb from Ginskey to Owen Beyer on second-and-long. One play later, Hullopeter snatched a pass between the hashes roughly 15 yards down field, knifed through a pair of defenders before spinning away from an on-charging New Prague cornerback and galloping into the end zone, crossing the line with 1:59 on the clock.

“I felt the guy coming (from behind) and just spun away and used my momentum and stayed on my feet and just kept going,” said Hullopeter.

Owatonna is back in action on Friday, Sept. 22 at Northfield (2-1 overall, 1-0 Northstar Maroon). the Raiders blew out Rochester John Marshall 44-0 on Saturday evening.

NOTES: The teams combined for five turnovers in the fourth quarter alone…New Prague was whistled for 10 penalties, a large chunk of which came on four consecutive plays in the second quarter that went: False start, holding, false start, false start…New Prague senior quarterback Will Seymour completed 12 passes for 189 yards, connecting on five throws of 20 or more yards.

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