MAXWELL—Brady football coach Bob Frederickson has watched the game film from Friday night and has checked, even re-checked, all of the stat numbers.

Still, Frederickson said, if he didn’t have the 16-6 final score ingrained in his memory, he would think the Eagles beat Maxwell in their season opener.

But they didn’t.

Brady more than doubled Maxwell’s rushing yards and was within a handful of the Wildcats’ passing total.

Frederickson said crucial mistakes at critical times cost the Eagles the win.

“We got in the red zone four times without a score,” the coach said. “It certainly wasn’t a lack of effort but our execution was a little off. Our continuity seemed to be out of whack all night.”

Maxwell opened the game with a six-play drive that ended with a 36-yard touchdown pass from Drew Solie to David Knapp.

Connor Norton ran in the two-point conversion to put the Wildcats up 8-0 with nine minutes to play in the first quarter.

After holding the Eagles out on their first possession, Maxwell scored again before the end of the period with a screen pass from Solie to Norton from 41 yards out.

Solie hit Knapp for the two-point conversion and Maxwell had a 16-0 lead with a minute left in the quarter.

“Those two plays made a huge difference,” Frederickson said. “I think the kids got a little caught up in the mental game.”

The score remained 16-0 until the Eagles found the endzone on their first drive of the second half when quarterback Zach Mann hit Michael Neiman with a 17-yard touchdown pass.

The two-point conversion play failed but Brady had closed the gap to 16-6.

Brady came close to scoring again in the fourth quarter but a pair of long passes sailed out of bounds or over intended receivers.

Sawyer Burke led the Eagle rushing attack with 58 yards on 14 carries.

Mann completed 9-of-23 passes for 96 yards including one 23-yard reception by Ryan Porter.

“It was the first game and a rivalry game right off the bat,” Frederickson said. “We have some kids who didn’t see a lot of playing time last year on the field and we made a lot of mental mistakes.”

The errors, Frederickson said, were little things that can be fixed before the Eagles hit the road to face Stapleton/McPherson County on Friday.

“SMC has some young but talented players,” the coach said. “We need to clean up the errors and find a little more fire in the belly.”

Kickoff Friday is set for 7:30 p.m. at Stapleton.