Moose junior runs for 4 TDs

FAIRBANKS — Palmer’s Vincent Aumavae had his way with the Lathrop’s defense in Friday night’s Railbelt Conference high school football opener at Lathrop Stadium.

Aumavae ran through and around the Malemutes for most of the night to lead the Moose to a 50-16 victory, a week after both teams scored season-opening victories.

Aumavae, a 5-foot-8, 167-pound junior running back filling in for an injured James Nisbett, scored four touchdowns and rushed for more than 100 yards en route to leading the Moose to victory.

“I just ran as hard as I could,” he said after the two teams shook hands after the game.

Nisbett scored twice in the win.

Aumavae accounted for four of Palmer's first six scores in the game.

“He’s a tough kid who loves playing the game,” Palmer coach Rod Christiansen said. “He plays hard all the time.”

Nisbett carried the ball twice for 25 yards on Palmer’s first two plays and scored twice, but did miss the bulk of the game on the offensive side of the ball due to injury.

“I just wish we didn’t get so many kids dinged up out there tonight,” Christiansen said. “We had a lot of other kids step up and play well.”

Trailing 21-0 late in the first half, the Malemutes got their offense going and almost got on the scoreboard as the half came to an end.

On a fourth down play from the Palmer 3, Lathrop quarterback Gabriel Cunningham completed a pass to Josh Semiinario, who was partially in the end zone, but the ball never crossed the goal line.

Lathrop took the second half kickoff and marched in for its first score to cut the deficit to 21-8.

“It could have been a 14- or 15-point swing and that would have been huge,” Lathrop coach Rusty Ham said.

Lathrop turned to running back Kaelen Lee in the second half and he made several big runs to try and get the Malemutes back in the game.

He scored on a 12-yard run to get the Malemutes on the scoreboard 9:28 remaining in the second quarter and Cunningham ran in the 2-point conversion to cut the deficit to 13 points.

After another Aumavae touchdown, Palmer quarterback Cameron Christiansen connected with Dylan Myers for a 10-yard TD pass to make the score 28-8, the Malemutes answered with Cunningham’s 28-yard TD strike to Derrick O’Neal with 2:44 left in the third. Cunningham connected with Gabe Ashton for the two-point conversion and Lathrop trailed 28-16.

Palmer answered right back with an Aumavae touchdown a little more than a minute later and the Moose got fourth-quarter scores from Aumavae and brother Benjamin Aumavae to round out the scoring.

Despite the loss, Ham said there were plenty of things the Malemutes could build on.

“We played four tough quarters against one of the top teams in our conference,” Ham said. “I thought we played well against a first-class team.

“There were a lot of bright spots out there, so the key for us is to keep supporting each other,” Ham added.