Messenger photo by Britt Kudla: Jamarius Gibbs-Green of Fort Dodge scores a touchdown against Storm Lake on Friday night at Dodger Stadium.

As is often the case with Homecoming week, the complicated emotions and landslide of distractions bled into Fort Dodge’s football game with Storm Lake on Friday.

When push came to shove, though, the Dodgers simplified their 55-26 victory over the Tornadoes at the point of attack with a dominant performance in the trenches.

Fort Dodge pushed its winning streak to five for the first time in nine years, rushing for 342 yards at nearly 10 yards a pop to pull away from Storm Lake and its vaunted passing attack.

Dodger senior tailback Jamarius Gibbs-Green topped the 200-yard plateau for the second consecutive season against the Tornadoes, putting up 203 yards and three touchdowns in barely over a half of work. Sophomore teammate Ezrah Barkhaus took over from there, with 115 of his 124 yards coming in the second half.

With seniors Gavin Pederson and Jackson McQuillen, juniors Luke Fierke and Carter Short and sophomore Joe Constable paving the way up front, Fort Dodge (5-1 overall, 2-0 in Class 4A, District 1) controlled the tempo and the line of scrimmage to end a day that was otherwise far from predictable.

“It was great to see us follow through on our gameplan,” FDSH head coach Nik Moser said. “We knew we had to establish the run and try to keep the ball out of their hands as much as possible. Jamar did a great job. Ezrah came in and got some quality reps. Our offensive line did what it needed to do and opened up some huge holes, especially up the middle.

“Everything else was pretty choppy. Not ‘bad’ (per se), but we have to get better. This stretch coming up is obviously huge…we have to clean some stuff up.”

Gibbs-Green flew past the 1,000-yard mark for his career in just his 10th start. When the Dodger line wasn’t gashing Storm Lake’s defensive front and opening up huge holes, Gibbs-Green darted in and out of seemingly-precarious situations with impressive balance and footwork.

For a while, the Tornadoes (3-3, 1-1) were a tough out. It was a 21-18 ballgame early in the second quarter, as standout signal caller Charlie Dvergsten — the state’s overall leader in both passing and total offense — put the pressure on Fort Dodge with nearly 200 yards through the air in the first 12-plus minutes alone.

Slowly but surely, though, the Dodgers took over. They scored 34 of the contest’s final 42 points, and Dvergsten barely reached 100 passing yards the rest of the way on Storm Lake’s final six possessions.

“He’s a really good quarterback and athlete. As advertised,” Moser said of Dvergsten. “We knew coming in he’d be tough to contain, and he’s a threat with both his arm and his feet. He has some talented receivers to work with, too.

“As things progressed, though, I thought we started to get better pressure on him and forced him to make quicker and tougher decisions.”

Gibbs-Green exploded for touchdown sprints of 34 and 66 yards in the first half, then later added a 9-yarder to paydirt for good measure. Senior Royce Pederson — the team’s quarterback last season — hit Dalton Eckley for a 26-yard scoring strike on a fullback pass, and sophomore Tru McBride hooked up with Tytrell Mosley for a backbreaking TD as the first half came to a close.

The floodgates then opened when junior Jesse Egli rumbled 82 yards to the end zone on the opening kickoff of the second half. Junior Noah Daniel added a 7-yard tochdown on a shovel pass from McBride, and the quarterback had the final Dodger TD on a keeper with 9:18 remaining in regulation to end the onslaught.

Dvergsten didn’t make many mistakes, but FDSH sophomores Jayce Skow (fumble recovery) and Amarie Pettigrew (interception) both came up with turnovers.

McBride was an efficient 15 of 20 for 119 yards. The Dodger offense ended up 13 yards shy of 500 for the game.

Gibbs-Green and Barkhaus became the first Fort Dodge teammates since Jontel Clayton and Darreus Caston on Oct. 2, 2009 to both eclipse the century mark for rushing yards on the same night.

Dvergsten misfired on five of his final six throws after starting 20 of 27. His 307 yards from scrimmage were actually below his season average of 328.

Fort Dodge was dinged for 14 penalties spanning 135 yards — numbers Moser knows can’t continue heading down the home stretch.

“We’ve got to get focused now and really bear down with a short week ahead and a quality opponent on the road in Le Mars.”

The Dodgers make the 130-mile trek and square off with the Bulldogs (3-3, 1-1) this Thursday in a contest that was moved up a day due to an officiating shortage. Le Mars was 7-2 a year ago and a 4A playoff qualifier.

FD SL

First Downs 22 14

Rushes-Yards 36-342 12-51

Passing Yards 145 278

Comp-Att-Int 16-21-0 21-33-1

Total Offense 487 329

Punts-Avg. 1-38.0 3-31.0

Fumbles-Lost 1-1 1-1

Penalties-Yards 14-135 11-101

Fort Dodge 21 13 14 7 — 55

Storm Lake 12 6 8 0 — 26

Scoring Summary

Storm Lake — Rylan Richardson (4-yard run), 7:59 left first quarter. Kick failed.

Fort Dodge — Jamarius Gibbs-Green (34-yard run), 3:24 left first. Pass failed.

Fort Dodge — Dalton Eckley (26-yard pass from Royce Pederson), 3:04 left first. Tru McBride run.

Storm Lake — David William (80-yard pass from Charlie Dvergsten), 2:52 left first. Pass failed.

Fort Dodge — Gibbs-Green (66-yard run), 1:55 left first. Albert Myrvold kick.

Storm Lake — Richardson (45-yard pass from Dvergsten), 11:10 left second. Pass failed.

Fort Dodge — Gibbs-Green (9-yard run), 7:00 left second. Kick failed.

Fort Dodge — Tytrell Mosley (1-yard pass from McBride), 0:10 left second. Myrvold kick.

Fort Dodge — Jesse Egli (82-yard kickoff return), 11:46 left third. Myrvold kick.

Fort Dodge — Noah Daniel (7-yard pass from McBride), 6:01 left third. Myrvold kick.

Storm Lake — Richardson (10-yard pass from Dversgten), 2:21 left third. Cameron Boyd run.

Fort Dodge — McBride (3-yard run), 9:18 left fourth. Myrvold kick.

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

Rushing — Fort Dodge: Jamarius Gibbs-Green 19-203, Ezrah Barkhaus 15-124, Tru McBride 2-15. Storm Lake: Charlie Dvergsten 3-29, Marco Cortes-Oropeza 8-18, Rylan Richardson 1-4, Team 1-(minus-2).

Passing — Fort Dodge: Tru McBride 15-20-0-119, Royce Pederson 1-1-0-26. Storm Lake: Charlie Dvergsten 22-33-1-278, Cameron Boyd 0-1-0-0.

Receiving — Fort Dodge: Tytrell Mosley 5-43, Dalton Eckley 3-30, Jamarius Gibbs-Green 1-22, Noah Daniel 3-20, Collin Tornabane 3-20, Kyree Rochon 1-10. Storm Lake: David William 4-96, Rylan Richardson 6-94, Cameron Boyd 6-75, Garbieno Weno 1-11, Bobby Boeckman 2-4, Marco Cortes-Oropeza 3-(minus-2).