The coaches took the blame for the first mistake.

After that, except for the penalties, there wasn’t much blame to assign.

The Tomah High School football team overcame a disaster on its second play from scrimmage and was close to flawless after that in a surprising 34-6 whipping of La Crosse Central Friday at E.J. McKean Field.

It was Central’s first loss of the season, and the win got Tomah back into the Mississippi Valley Conference title race. Tomah improved to 2-1 heading into the Oct. 3 showdown at Onalaska.

Tomah coach Brad Plueger said his team did an excellent job recovering from last week’s 21-6 loss at La Crosse Logan.

“Even though we were bummed about the Logan game, I told them we control our own destiny, but it starts tonight,” Plueger said.

The start was anything but good. Plueger inserted sophomore Tyler Von Haden as the quarterback in place of Dustin Burkwalt, and the second play from scrimmage was an interception of a flanker screen pass that Ryan Pedretti returned for a touchdown.

Plueger said the coaching staff wanted to start Von Haden off with a safe pass and didn’t anticipate the defensive back jumping the play.

“The pass was a coaching fault,” Plueger said.

Tomah turned things around quickly. T.J. Hove returned the ensuing kickoff 28 yards to the Timberwolves’ 46, and Tomah kept the ball for the next 12 plays. Even though the Timberwolves didn’t score, they drove deep into Central territory.

Three plays after a Central punt gave Tomah excellent field positron at the Raiders’ 40, tailback Joel Sweeney broke loose on a 41-yard touchdown run. Clayton Barrix added the extra point to give Tomah a 7-6 lead with 88 seconds left in the first quarter.

Central got two first downs on its next possession before punting to the Tomah 27. The Timberwolves moved deep into Central territory on a 22-yard Sweeney run and a 24-yard pass from Von Haden to Burkwalt, who lined up at wide receiver. Sweeney capped the drive with a 4-yard touchdown run with 7:58 left in the second quarter.

Late in the second quarter, Sweeney busted loose on a 51-yard touchdown run with 3:34 left in the half. The extra point failed, and Tomah led, 20-6, at halftime.

Central didn’t get a first down on either of its first two second-half possessions. Tomah scored again when sophomore tailback Tanner Costello capped a six-play, 43-yard drive by motoring through a hole on the right side and scoring on a 12-yard dash. Barrix booted the extra point for a 27-6 advantage with 46 seconds left in the third quarter.

The Raiders returned the ensuing kickoff their own 37, and Garrett Schultz busted off a 42-yard run on the next play. But two plays later, Alex Gandy pounced on a Central fumble to end the scoring threat.

On Central’s next possession, linebacker Tanner Culpitt recovered a fumble, and on the next play, wide receiver Rhett Monroe took a reverse 39 yards for the touchdown. Barrix’s extra point made it 34-6 with 8:15 left.

Plueger put in the backups after that.

Balanced workload

Sweeney finished with 240 yards on 25 carries, and Plueger was happy that his junior tailback didn’t have to carry the entire rushing load. He got plenty of help from Costello and tailback Ross Lynch, who shouldered their share of the load with 16 carries each.

“All three running backs are very good runners, and they’re getting better at blocking,” Plueger said.

It helped that Tomah finally had its original starting offensive line of Alex Kivimaki, Mike Leinen, Scott Kaul, J.J. Johnson and David Pierce back in place.

Plueger was also very happy with a defense that allowed no points and forced three turnovers. This week, there was no repeat of the overrun plays at Logan.

“We pushed all week long to read the guards, read the line -- they’ll take you to the play,” Plueger said.