“I liked the enthusiasm and the belief that we’re going to be good,” head coach Dennis Millican said. “We had some bad plays in there but we responded very well. Those are two very good teams. We did pretty good against both.”

Both Sallisaw and Stigler were playoff teams a year ago in Classes 4A and 3A, respectively.

Grove’s first touchdown was sparked by a long catch and run by Trent Lyle, who took a short slant pass and turned it into a 40-yard gain. That was followed by a 15-yard run by quarterback Jake Spychalski before Garrett Sisco finished the drive with a short touchdown run against Stigler’s defense.

A long completion to Clayton Honeycutt against Sallisaw led to a 15-yard touchdown run by Spychalski on Grove’s final offensive drive of the night.

“We have various guys to get the ball to on offense and we have a system that we can spread the ball around the field,” Millican said. “We’re going to get better as we have more practice time and see things on film.”

Defensively the Ridgerunners were strong against the run for the entire scrimmage, but mistakes in the secondary led to two Stigler touchdowns.

The Panthers, who reached the quarterfinals a year ago in 3A, got a 25-yard touchdown pass on the final play of their possession, the first of the night for the Grove defense. Another long completion would lead to a short touchdown run by the Panthers on the final series of the night.

In between, the Ridgerunners stymied Sallisaw, getting an interception by Ty Phillips and a sack by Colby Layman along the way.

“I don’t think we gave up a big run [tonight],” Millican said. “We gave up a couple of passes where we didn’t keep it in front of us. We can’t have those mistakes, but as far as shoring up and being better against the run, that was a big improvement in that area. Our front four held their ground and didn’t get blown off the ball.”

The Ridgerunners will have their final scrimmage at Vinita on Thursday before opening the regular season at home against Miami on Sept. 6.