The Ell-Saline Cardinals saw their season come to abrupt end Friday with a 32 point home loss to the Hoxie Indians. Hoxie was clearly the more physical team, but the Cardinals were able to hang with the Indians for most of the first half before getting outscored in half #2 by 18 points.

The only score of the first quarter came with 2:43 remaining in the stanza when star running back for Hoxie, senior Ryan Shaw, got the first of his four touchdowns on a 9-yard run.

The Cardinals would tie the game early in the second quarter when senior QB Kade Wilson ran it in from 7 yards out. The game really turned in favor of the Indians at about the midway point of the  2nd . Shaw scored on a 5-yard run with 6:49 to go before half and then just :27 later had a 2-yard TD run. The score at half was 20-6 in favor of Hoxie.

The Indians got the ball to start the third quarter and promptly marched down the field to score on a 4-yard run by Shaw. The Cardinals would answer that score with 4:46 to go in the 3rd when Wilson threw a 5-yard scoring pass to junior Joe Heichel. After that, it was all Hoxie. Indian senior quarterback Brady Jones snuck it in from the 1-yardline to make the score at the end of the 3rd quarter 32-12.

Hoxie would add two 4th quarter scores. First, with 11:29 to go in the game, senior Drew Bretz carried it in from the 8-yardline and then back-up QB sophomore Duncan Bell refused to be brought down and scored from the 4-yardline.

For the Cardinals, Kade Wilson was the Nex-Tech Wireless Player of the Game and the H&R Block of the game went to junior Ryder Dent Ell-Saline ends the 2022 campaign with a record of 6-3. Meanwhile Hoxie, now 7-2, plays Wichita County next week with a chance to avenge a week 3 loss.

Scoring by quarters:
TEAM 1 2 3 4 FINAL
Hoxie 6 14 12 12 44
Ell-Saline 0 6 6 0 12