Hines Shines As Maroons Roll To Second Playoff Win Before this season, uncertainty loomed around the Menominee Maroons.
The team was coming off a less-than-stellar 5-4 campaign and was losing a plethora of seniors, including a Big Ten recruit in Jacob Pedersen.
With a roster that included six sophomores and a steady diet of juniors at many key positions, it was unsure how Menominee would fare.
After two weeks of playoff football, one thing’s for sure.
Maroon junior Erik Hines is darn good, and his buddy Keefer Conery and the rest of the Maroons aren’t so bad either.
Menominee cruised to their second playoff victory with a 48-12 beatdown of Negaunee in Menominee Saturday afternoon, advancing to the regional title game for the fourth time in five years.
“I have no complaints,” Maroon coach Ken Hofer said. “I thought our young people came out and went to work right off the bat.”
It didn’t take long for Hines and the Maroon offense to make an impact.
After a four-yard run by Tyler Uecke, Hines ran a hitch route, stiff-armed a defender to the turf and raced down the left sideline on a 60-yard pass from Conery.
He was pushed out of bounds at the two yard line but Conery scored on the next play to give the Maroons a one-touchdown lead.
Luke Vincent added the first of his six extra points to make it 7-0 less than a minute into the contest.
Charles Lingis blew up an option run on the Miners’ first play and Conery made a tackle for a four-yard loss, putting Negaunee in a second and long and forcing the option team to the air.
Menominee would get the ball back on the three-and-out after two consecutive incompletions, but Conery’s pass for a leaping Hines was too high and was picked off.
Negaunee’s Jordan Velmer ripped off a 22-yard run on the first play after the interception but a fumbled exchanged was recovered by Menominee’s Josh Forgette and the Maroons took over at the Miner 29.
Conery hooked up with Erik Gilbert on a five-yard pass on the first play, before Hines made a leaping grab of a Conery pass for six more yards and a first down.
Conery got three yards on first down before Uecke was stuffed for no gain, and on third down Conery went back to the air, and Hines.
Faking a quick pass to Hines, Conery pumped and froze the man/zone mix that was keeping an eye on Hines, and the speedy junior raced untouched to the endzone on a wheel route for a 57-yard score.
“He had probably, as he said, the best game of his life,” said Hofer of Hines, who also intercepted three Negaunee passes on defense. “He’s a very good athlete. He’s not the biggest, most physical kid. When he’s way out there on the sideline, there’s not too many of them that are gonna catch him.”
The Menominee defense produced another three-play series but Matt Macco’s fumble on the first play of the ensuing drive was lost and the drive stalled.
This time, the Menominee defense got to fourth down and made a stop as Hines deflected a pass near the endzone.
The Maroon offense was finally stopped as they punted to the Miners, who again failed to do anything and lined up to punt from their own 36.
Sophomore Tanner Maccoux got a good jump along the right side of the defense and blocked a punt, and the Maroons took over for their third scoring drive.
On third down from the 26, Conery found Gilbert for a 13-yard gain, setting up Uecke’s five-yard touchdown a play later.
Menominee’s resurgent defense made another stop on four plays, ultimately sealing the fate of Negaunee, who was desperate enough to go for it from their own 36.
After a block in the back penalty moved Menominee back, Conery and Hines moved them back forward with a 27-yard pass.
Conery got two yards before a pair of incompletions, and he scrambled for nine yards and enough for a first down two plays later.
Uecke scored again from five yards on the next play to make it 27-0 Maroons.
Hines would haul in his second touchdown and third reception of over 50 yards later in the quarter, as he secured a 54-yarder from Conery, and Vincent added the kick to make it 34-0.
“I didn’t expect to have a 34-0 lead at halftime, I’ll tell you that,” Hofer admitted of the second-round blowout. “We figured we would have a very difficult time running inside so we attacked the outside more.”
The Maroons didn’t run the ball all that well the entire game, but it was short passes and Hines’ ability to run after the catch that separated them from their northern U.P. opponent.
Of the 390 yards picked up by the Maroon offense, 259 of them came on 17 pass plays, a 15.2-yard per attempt average.
Conery completed 9-of-15 pass attempts for all 259 yards and two scores.
On the ground, the junior had just 28 yards on eight runs.
Uecke was the leading rusher with 37 yards, running 10 times and scoring on three of them.
He added his third score from two yards out in the third quarter and Hines gave Menominee their last score when he intercepted a pass and returned it 77 yards to paydirt.
He had 111 return yards on three picks to go with his 208 receiving yards on five catches.
Conery also intercepted a pass for the Maroons (9-2), who will be playing in the state quarterfinals against undefeated Clare (11-0), a 28-18 winner against Pinconning.
“11-0 tells me they’ve got a pretty good football team,” Hofer admitted. “As you go in the playoffs, each team is a little bit better, otherwise they wouldn’t be there.”
“I think we have a good chance,” Hofer continued. “If we play a good game of football, we can get the job done. If we play as well as we played (against Negaunee) and a little bit better, the coach will be well satisfied.”
The game will be played at a neutral site due to the huge mileage discrepancy between the two schools.
Still, the Maroons have to travel five hours for the game, which will take place Saturday in Gaylord at 1 p.m. Central Standard Time.
The Maroon bus will leave about 5:30 in the morning Saturday, something Hofer says is “not to our liking.”
The Maroons are hoping to ride the wave of momentum they have established on their six-game winning streak.
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