For the Pleasant Grove football team’s defense, the second half of its road win at Maple Mountain was all about adjustments.

They made the right moves and put up a stone wall at the 50-yard line.

The Vikings gave up 33 points in the first half (including a kickoff return for a touchdown) and trailed by 13. But the visitors made the right defensive adjustments to shut out the Golden Eagles in the second half. In fact, Maple Mountain never crossed midfield after halftime and Pleasant Grove earned a 34-33 victory, the first win for new coach Taylor Walkenhorst.

“The biggest thing was that we were making a lot of small mistakes on defense,” Walkenhorst said. “We had mental errors in our alignment, so we had to fix those. There were times we’d be in a certain coverage and our free safety or our stud linebacker wasn’t in the right alignment and that’s where they (Maple Mountain) were able to get those big plays.”

The two teams traded scores in the first half but Maple Mountain surged ahead with a 26-point second quarter, converting interceptions from Dillon Silva and Cole McAllister into points to take the lead.

Jaeden Wright scored on three short touchdown runs for Pleasant Grove, but Maple Mountain countered with some electrifying plays from Jaxson Denton and McAllister.

Denton, who at 5-foot-7 and 145 points also snaps for PAT’s and field goals, scored three times in the first half on runs of 78, 2 and 30. McAllister took a Pleasant Grove kickoff 99 yards for a touchdown and Denton’s third score of the half lifted the home team to a 33-20 halftime lead.

“Something we always talk about all the time in practice and at halftime is we have to know what we’re doing,” said PG senior linebacker Gavin Ivie, who spearheaded the Viking defense. “We’ve just got to use great effort and great technique. If we could be smart out there we knew we could shut them out and stop them in the second half.”

The halftime defensive adjustments completely shut down the Maple Mountain offense and led to excellent field possession for the Vikings. Sophomore quarterback Nic Staffieri overcame three interceptions to lead Pleasant Grove on a pair of second-half touchdown drives.

On the opening drive of the second half, Staffieri connected with Kael McCoy on 20-yard touchdown pass on fourth down to cut the Maple Mountain lead to 33-27.

In the fourth quarter, Staffieri alternated feeding freshman running back Wade Christensen and hitting timely throws. A 19-yard pass to Shawn Cottle reached the Maple Mountain 5-yard line and on the next play EJ Hoover pounded over for the touchdown with 9:20 to play in the game. The extra point by Seth Lyman gave the Vikings a precarious one-point lead.

Maple Mountain finally picked up a couple of first downs and reached its own 49-yard line with three minutes to play, but on fourth-and-3 the Golden Eagles failed to convert a pass and Pleasant Grove took over. Staffieri hooked up with Kolton Tanner for a big first down and the Vikings ran out the clock from there.

“I feel like the guys came and were a lot more physical in the second half and they didn’t give up,” Walkenhorst said. “We kept fighting the whole time and that’s what I’m really proud of. We needed this win to build our confidence. We’ve got so many sophomores and freshman that play. Wade Christiansen at running back and Ryker Mikkelsen at safety, they’re both playing out there as freshmen. They needed this win so they know that they can do it.”

Pleasant Grove (1-1) will host four-time state champion Orem next Friday. Maple Mountain (1-1) is at Farmington for a Thursday night game.

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