Eagles’ football season ends on cold night in Maple Grove

With snowbanks surrounding the sidelines, autumn seemed to give way to winter in Maple Grove on Friday night, where the Eden Prairie Eagles’ season ended in cold finality as November winds swept across football fields throughout Minnesota.

“It just goes to show how quick stuff can go,” Eagles defensive back and captain Max Kukla said. “It’s senior year, it’s the last football game I’ll ever play. So I’m just gonna try to take that into the lacrosse season the rest of the school year.”

Eden Prairie collided with a seemingly unstoppable offense in top-ranked and undefeated Maple Grove, which slammed the door on the Eagles’ season in a lopsided 34-0 decision in the second-round playoff clash.

Crimson running back Charles Langama looked unstoppable at times, rushing for 118 yards on 15 carries and two touchdowns. 

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His first touchdown came on a 28-yard run in which he reversed field from one sideline to the other before finding the endzone, capping off a 10-play, 94-yard drive to give Maple Grove a 14-0 lead at the end of the first quarter.

“He’s very good,” senior linebacker and captain James Anderson said. “It took more than one guy to take him down every time. He’s a great running back.”

It was difficult for the Eagles, winners of four straight games heading into the contest, to keep up with the Crimson’s high-powered scoring attack.

Maple Grove amassed 337 total yards of offense – 226 on the ground – while sustaining drives by converting on seven-of-11 third downs and two-of-two fourth-down situations.

Eden Prairie was unable to capitalize on opportunities in the first half, which only compounded their ineffectiveness on a frustrating night. 

Eagles head coach Mike Grant said his team needed to play a near-perfect game to put themselves in a position to win. 

That didn’t happen on this frigid Friday night.

“For us to beat them, we had to catch the interception on the first drive,” Grant said, recapping a number of missed opportunities. “They fumbled a snap and recovered it. We hit their quarterback (Kaden Harney) hard, and he just threw the ball up in the air and their kid caught it for a first down.

“All those things had to go our way in order to beat them and to keep it close at half.”

The Eagles offense put up 224 total yards, all but 40 on the ground. They were led by senior running back and captain Elijah Rumph, who rushed for 94 yards on 16 carries. 

Senior running back and captain Jeremy Fredericks add 73 yards on 21 carries.

“We moved the ball pretty well in the second half,” Grant said. “You just can’t make those mistakes. We’ve been on the other side of this, where you can’t make those mistakes against us and we can’t make those against them.” 

Defensively, the Eagles were led by seniors Matthew Ivey and Vaughn Feely, each with six tackles.

But the Eden Prairie defense struggled to get off the field on third down, leaving the door open for Langama to churn up yardage. The Crimson also threw the ball effectively, as Harney completed seven-of-14 passes for 111 yards.

“Maple Grove is a great team. I hope they have a good season,” Ivey, a captain, said afterward. 

Maple Grove’s offensive line is composed entirely of seniors, an advantage the Eagles did not have this season with a young front. But Grant is optimistic for the group entering next season with experience to compete in Eden Prairie’s always-demanding schedule.

“They have big, physical kids. And that’s the difference,” Grant said. “We start almost all juniors in our offensive line, and it’s just that physicality of that year just makes a difference. And next year, we’ll have that veteran senior offensive line that we can impose our will on, and kind of like they’ve imposed their will on us tonight.”

With their victory over the Eagles, Maple Grove (10-0) will move on to face Edina in the state quarterfinals on a neutral site at Park Center High School on Thursday.

Eden Prairie, a program accustomed to closing out its seasons indoors at U.S. Bank Stadium, finishes the 2024 campaign with a 6-4 record and looks ahead to 2025.

Grant wraps up his 32nd season at Eden Prairie, a career that includes 16 playoff appearances and 11 state championships. The head coach expressed admiration for his latest team, citing their determination throughout the season.

“I’m just proud of them, because they played so hard all year, through the ups and downs,” Grant said. “And tonight, they played hard right till the end, and that’s all we can ask from them.”

And for the seniors, many remained on the cold field in Maple Grove to stretch their season out a bit longer, expressing gratitude for teammates and memories to last a lifetime.

“Just all the lessons I learned from all the guys, about hard work, about leadership,” Ivey said. “Football, it’s a game, but it’s more than a game. It’s the opportunity to work hard and to work as a team towards something, and it means something more than just a game.”