The effort and determination from the Iowa Central football team was not lost on head coach Jesse Montalto here Saturday afternoon.

Stuck in a slide having lost five of six, the Tritons provided those inside Dodger Stadium with reason to smile, besting Ellsworth, 58-7.

All five defeats during the recent skid came by 11 points or less, with four by seven or few and two by just a single point.

Still, Montalto saw the kind of character he has come to expect from his kids since leaving Ellsworth for Iowa Central seven years ago.

“We ask a lot out of these kids so for them to let loose and have some fun like this, that was great,” Montalto said. “We were able to get everybody involved and reward the kids who have worked so hard with time out on the field.”

One of those was former Clarion-Goldfield/Dows standout Preston Gardner, who saw the final snaps of the game at quarterback. Gardner carried the ball multiple times on the fnal drive of the contest.

“Preston is a great, great kid,” Montalto said. “He has a 4.0 GPA and is going to be an NJCAA Academic All-American. He had the opportunity to run down the field on a kickoff and get out there at quarterback for some snaps. It’s just great to see things like that happen to kids who deserve it.”

Ty Purdy had 174 yards passing and three touchdowns, Dallas Sauser tossed two scores and had 141 yards in the air while Cyncir Bowers accumulated 165 yards of total offense and two long touchdowns.

“Of course it would have been nice to have a game like this when we were going through that difficult part of our schedule but that is just the way it is,” Montalto said. “These kids could have given up and just finished things out but they came to practice each day and have wanted to get better. That shows the character of the kids and what it means to them, and what it means to us coaches.”

Dalen Huston, Austin Aybamidele, Jacob Kania and Akili Mattox all caught touchdowns while Nyqua Lett had a rushing score. Caleb Moore had a 90-yard interception return for a TD and the Triton defense recorded a safety.

Iowa Central is now off this coming weekend before hitting the road to Independence on Nov. 2. They have one home game remaining, the following week vs. Garden City, before closing out the year at Butler.