Although the offense scored all the points for Eudora High in its 47-13 victory over Kansas City Piper, the Cardinals defense set the tone Tuesday night in the first round of Class 4A state playoffs.

After the Eudora offense fumbled on the first play from scrimmage at its own 32-yard line, the defense forced a turnover on downs – back at the 48-yard line.

It was a sign of things to come as the Cardinals (9-0) allowed only three first downs. The Pirates (5-5) had only two plays longer than 10 yards in the game, and finished with minus-5 yards of total offense.

“Thank god our defense played, because our offense was nonexistent throughout the first half,” Eudora coach Gregg Webb said. “Coming into the game we thought our defense could play well enough to at least contain them a little bit, but we had some issues against their defense.”

Despite the 13 points put up by Piper, only one touchdown was scored against the Eudora defense – and it came on a 30-yard drive following a 66-yard kickoff return. The other Pirates touchdown came on a 75-yard return by Kenny Kuklenski following a Travis Clarke fumble.

But Clarke did his share on offense to more than make up for that one miscue. He carried the ball 22 times for 114 yards and three touchdowns, the longest coming from 24 yards out.

Eudora High's Austin Hoover breaks a tackle against Kansas City Piper during the second quarter. The Cardinals didn't score on the drive, but still cruised to a 47-13 victory in the opening round of the Class 4A playoffs.

“He’s tough. He’s not very big and I’m not disappointed with his running – he wasn’t getting any help from our kids up front for the most part,” Webb said. “But he’s such a good kid and he wants to do well and runs hard and he’ll do whatever I ask him to do. It’s just nice to see him succeed – it really is nice to see him succeed, he’s one of those kids you want to see do well.

“But it’s good to be a tailback in coach Webb’s offense, because he’s going to touch it a lot of times and put a lot of the responsibility of moving the ball into his hands.”

While Clarke had a big night on the ground and quarterback Kent Swanson threw for 143 yards – including a touchdown to Matthew Abel – the offense barely had to move the ball in order to score.

“We didn’t know if we could move the ball with any consistency, but I thought we could have done better than we did – we were just bad offensively,” Webb said. “It was just really poor execution and the biggest concern is that our offensive line didn’t just maul them up front like I thought we should and could, until we wore them down. We just really showed the platoon thing and our kids were kind of fresh down the stretch and our defense kind of controlled the game.”

Kansas City Piper quarterback Joel Wright tries to scoop a fumble as Eudora's Todd Roberts closes in. The Cardinals dominated on defense in Tuesday night's 47-13 playoff victory at Laws Field.

Five of Eudora’s seven scoring drives started on Piper’s side of the field, with three of those five coming from forced turnovers – fumble recoveries by Todd Roberts and Evan Meyers, and one of Dustin Foulk’s two interceptions.

“Our defense just gave us such great field position over and over and over and they had to be frustrated as we were when we were turning it over,” Webb said. “It just kind of gets you in a negative mental state and your daubers down a little bit and then it’s tough to come back.

“Our offense kept telling our defense when they would run off the field after some really poor play in the first-half, ‘Just keep us in it defense, keep us in it.'”

The Cardinals will now go on the road for Saturday’s round of 16 game against fellow unbeaten Atchison.

Eudora 47, Kansas City Piper 13

Piper 0 0 6 7 – 13

Eudora 0 14 8 25 – 47

E – Travis Clarke 5 run (Austin Hoover run)

E – Clarke 7 run (run failed)

E – Clarke 24 run (Loni Ogden run)

P – Kenny Kuklenski 75 fumble (kick failed)

E – Ogden 2 run (pass failed)

E – Matthew Abel 7 pass from Kent Swanson (kick failed)

E – Hoover 4 run (kick failed)

P – E.J. James 8 run (Alex Jones kick)

E – Hoover 3 run (Joel Lauer kick)