The #9 in 4A Indianola football team improved to 3-0 on the season with a 33-19 win over Pella as heard live on 94.3 KNIA and 92.1 KRLS, after a wild back and forth first half settled into a low-scoring second half.

The Indians got things going first, finding the endzone on a Bennett Brueck to Drew Kingery 12-yard touchdown, only to see Pella answer on a long running play from Kenson Fuller to get the score to 7-6. The Indians answered with an interception and a 6-yard scamper from Matt Edgington to take a 13-6 advantage, only to again see Pella tie the score at 13 with another lengthy running play by Fuller. Brueck then connected with Kingery again on a 69-yard wide receiver screen play for yet another score, which was then answered yet one more time by Pella’s Fuller on a 4th down carry, and the Indians rounded out the first half scoring with a Brueck to Edgington screen play connection for 57 yards to take a 26-19 lead into halftime.

After giving up 191 yards and three scores to Pella’s running back Fuller, Indianola settled down and held the Dutch to limited offense in the second half while getting another Brueck to Kingery score through the air to get to the final tally.

Head coach Eric Kluver said the Indians had to dig deep and play much better on the defensive side in the second half.

“The guys recognize we aren’t playing at the level that we are capable of playing. We’ve seen glimpses of it, and the word consistency has been thrown around a lot the last three weeks. But in the second half we finally played some consistent defense, tackled well, and lined up correctly while taking the right angles to the football.”

Pella Head Coach Jay McKinstrey saw better signs from his team this week, but knows they still need to take another step to compete with 4A’s best.

“Our focus this week was for our everybody to get a little bit better and for our guys to find the little things to get better at, and we played with a lot more passion, heart, and enthusiasm,” he says. “I was so excited to see how our kids played tonight and I’m so proud of them.”

Kingery finished with three receiving touchdowns for Indianola and Pella’s Fuller tallied 234 rushing yards and three scores.

Indianola improves to 3-0 on the season, and will travel to #2 Lewis Central next week. Pella falls to 0-3 and will host #7 Bondurant-Farrar.