By Wendi Reardon Price
Clarkston News Sports Writer
LAKE ORION — Clarkston Varsity Football wrapped last week with a 20-13 loss at Lake Orion High School last Friday.
“Hats off to Lake Orion, they made just enough plays tonight and early on,” said Justin Pintar, head coach. “They made some adjustments defensively that gave us some trouble today. They had a good game plan and I thought we competed hard. I thought they competed hard. It was a good football game.”
The Dragons jumped to a 6-0 lead three minutes into the game with a 29-yard touchdown run by Tristan Hill. The Wolves blocked the PAT.
Clarkston took the lead with just over six minutes to go in the first quarter with a 1-yard touchdown run from Griffin Boman. Aidan O’Neill scored on the PAT.
On the Lake Orion’s next drive, they finished with a 1-yard touchdown run by Jayden Borrero with three minutes left in the quarter, putting the Dragons up 13-10.

O’Neill wrapped the first half with a 24-yard field goal, his first of two for the night.
“We’ve got a great kicker, but I tell them all the time I don’t like field goals,” Pintar shared. “And he knows that. We trust him. He was 2-for-2 tonight on field goals and and gave us an opportunity there at the end. It’s painful when you go on a nice little drive, especially right at the end of the half.”
Lake Orion scored on a touchdown run by Ryan Rocheleau in the third quarter with 5:22 remaining and a PAT, to further the lead to 20-10.
O’Neill opened the fourth quarter with a 36-yard field goal.
“I thought our defense after the first couple series played great and gave us a chance. We just couldn’t finish a couple of the drives that we had. It seemed like every time we had a little bit of something going, we had a mistake a penalty of holding or something like that. We talk a lot about not having negative plays and if we don’t have negative plays, we’re pretty good on offense and I thought tonight that was one of the issues we had too many negative plays or a couple plays, that maybe just didn’t go anywhere.”
The Wolves (4-3, 2-2 OAA Red) have two games left in the regular season and Pintar shared this game will help prepare for those games and the post-season.
“This has to make us stronger,” he said. I think it will and I hope it will. I think this will be something that just motivates us even more than maybe we already had. I know we’ve got a very good football team, I know this league is as good a league as there is in the state. It’s hard to go and win this league and we had an opportunity tonight and came up a little bit empty, but losing the teams like we have – Belleville, Lake Orion and Rochester Adams – those are three teams that are as good as anybody in the state. We’re not ashamed of those losses. We just got to figure out some things and get a little bit better so that if we see those teams again, we execute a little bit better and we come out on top.”
The Wolves host Bloomfield Hills this Friday. Kick off is 7 p.m.

  Clarkston Athletics, Football