COEUR d'ALENE - What was shaping up as an easy Lake City victory on homecoming turned out to be a thriller - though the result remained the same.

The Timberwolves opened up a 28-7 lead in the second quarter, then needed a couple of defensive stops in the fourth quarter to hold off the Lewiston Bengals 31-28 in a 5A Inland Empire League football game Friday night at Lake City.

"Homecoming is always a big deal, and there's a lot of people and a lot of excitement," Lake City coach Van Troxel said. "And one thing about it, we gave a lot of excitement tonight. There was a lot of great plays, there was a number of stupid plays ... that's high school football. If I had the answer how to make them all do everything right all the time, it'd be easy. But it's not easy."

Lewiston (4-3, 0-1 5A IEL) pulled within 31-28 on the first play of the fourth quarter when junior quarterback Cole Zacha bootlegged 4 yards around right end for a touchdown, then rolled left and hit Ryan Rigney for the two-point conversion.

Lake City (3-3, 1-1) punted the ball back, and Lewiston drove to the Timberwolf 24 before a 41-yard field goal try by Cameron Berglund fell well short. Lake City punted again, the Bengals drove to the T-Wolf 41, where on fourth down and 9 a long pass to Lucky Gaskill near the goal line fell incomplete.

"What I am proud of is, they hang in and they fight and they scrap," Troxel said. "If we'd learn to quit hurting ourselves, we've got a chance to be a pretty good football team."

Lewiston scored on its third play of the game, when Randon Fuentes got behind the Lake City secondary and hauled in an 82-yard TD pass from Zacha.

Lake City tied it late in the first quarter on a 3-yard run by quarterback Bobby Traverse, then took the lead on the first play of the second quarter when Gavan Rosteck pressured Zacha into an interception by Colton Houlihan, who walked in from 14 yards out.

Mitch Bevacqua went 73 yards on a screen pass, and Houlihan ran 3 yards for a 28-7 lead with 3:37 left in the half.

Zacha and Aaron Kracke hooked up on TD passes in the second and third quarters to pull Lewiston within 28-20.

Zacha completed nine passes each to Fuentes and Kracke, and finished with 269 yards through the air. He had a stretch of 11 incompletions in 13 attempts in the first half and early in the second, but warmed up and completed 16 of 20 in one second-half stretch.

“Lewiston came well-prepared, and played hard.” Troxel said. “But honestly, we let them in the ballgame. We have an opportunity to put it away, and we don’t do it.”

Traverse threw for 216 of his 257 yards in the first half. Lake City had 286 of its 335 total yards in the first half.

“I’m really proud of the way we played,” Lewiston coach Emmitt Dougherty said. “Our kids fought back, showed a lot of character. A couple early mistakes by us got them that early lead.”

Next Friday, Lake City travels to Wenatchee (Wash.), and Lewiston visits Coeur d’Alene.

Lewiston 7 7 6 8 — 28

Lake City 7 21 3 0 — 31

Lew — Randon Fuentes 82 pass from Cole Zacha (Cameron Berglund kick)

LC — Bobby Traverse 3 run (Andrew Hocking kick)

LC — Colton Houlihan 14 interception return (Hocking kick)

LC — Mitch Bevacqua 73 pass from Travers (Hocking kick)

LC — Houlihan 3 run (Hocking kick)

Lew — Aaron Kracke 16 pass from Zacha (Berglund kick)

Lew — Kracke 17 pass from Zacha (kick failed)

LC — FG Hocking 24

Lew — Zacha 4 run (Ryan Rigney pass from Zacha)

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING — Lew, Gaskill 7-22, Roth 7-14, Poxleitner 6-4, Zacha 8-33, Fuentes 1-4. LC, Mitchell 1-16, Williams 11-50, Traverse 9-17, Bevacqua 3-(minus 8), Houlihan 1-3, Johnson 1-(minus 5), Hewitt 1-0.

PASSING — Lew, Zacha 21-41-2-269. LC, Traverse 14-27-2-257, Shipley 1-2-0-5.

RECEIVING — Lew, Fuentes 9-133, Kracke 9-119, Van Boeyen 1-(minus 3), Gaskill 1-8, Rigney 1-12. LC, Mitchell 4-58, Baker 5-65, Williams 1-13, Bevacqua 3-85, Martz 1-37, Balison 1-4.