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EIELSON AIR FORCE BASE — It was hard at times to tell that the North Pole Patriots held a 33-0 lead at halftime and were on their way to a 61-12 rout of the Eielson Ravens in Friday night’s nonconference high school football game at Buck Nystrom Field on Eielson Air Force Base.

The Patriots kept pounding away on both sides of the ball in the annual battle dubbed “The Blood Bowl.”

Quarterback Lee Jones, for example, was pressured with third down and 42 yards to go from the Patriots 48 early in the third quarter. The junior avoided a sack and heaved a 31-yard pass to Jared Isaacson to bring North Pole within 11 yards of a first down.

“We don’t let up, because we’ve got to get ready for West Anchorage (next Saturday at 2 p.m. at Patriot Pride Field). It’s going to be a hard challenge,” Jones said after the game. “We came in here confident and we stayed confident throughout the whole game. We couldn’t let up because we know we’ve got to prepare for next week at home.”

Patriots running back Dane Ebanez, as another example, wasn’t content with nine carries for 186 yards and two touchdowns in the first half — though he logged more yards by himself in the first two quarters than Eielson had accumulated in total offense (111).

He tacked on 49 more yards in the second half, all but six of them on a 43-yard touchdown burst with 3:45 left in the third quarter for a 47-0 lead for the Patriots, who went on to raise their overall record to 4-0 while raising the Blood Bowl trophy for the second straight year.

“Earlier this season, we had a problem with not going until the (final) whistle,” Ebanez said after his 12-carry, 235-yard night. “Our goal for the last two weeks has been to go until the whistle, and no matter what happens, find someone and hit them hard.”

The 5-foot-8, 172-pound speedster was hitting the holes hard, also scoring on runs of 72 and 24 yards in 27-second span in the second quarter.

“Obviously, my line was working for me,” Ebanez said. “The holes were so big, I just saw the field and ran with it.”

Both scores were set up by Eielson turnovers. The first touchdown at the 8:09 mark was set up by Eielson quarterback Colten Growden’s fumble at the end of a 14-yard run and the second TD, at the 7:42 mark, came after defensive back/kicker Phillip Hingst intercepted a pass.

Turnovers hampered a Ravens squad which dropped its second home game in a row to fall to 2-2 overall and was already hurting from the absence of junior Charles King, the state’s leading receiver, who was sidelined with an injury.

The Ravens had eight fumbles and lost four and Growden, before he scored both of Eielson’s touchdowns, threw two interceptions. North Pole fumbled seven times and lost two.

Eielson head coach David DeVaughn said the fumbles were a combination of poor ball control by the Ravens and a tough interior defense by the Patriots.

“It was a little bit of not taking care of the ball and trying to do too much after contact,’’ DeVaughn said. “You can’t really get on a kid for trying to get something extra. Definitely, ball security is something we’ll be focusing on next week.’’

North Pole’s interior defense forced Growden to scramble more than he wanted, leading to a team-high 147 yards on 28 carries.

“The middle was hard for us to run and we weren’t getting up inside,” DeVaughn said.

After the North Pole lead reached 54-0, Growden finally scored on a 7-yard with 6:02 left in the fourth and a 26-yard scamper with 1:52 remaining.

Josh Erickson also scored for the Patriots on a 15-yard run in the second quarter and Steve Wright returned a kickoff 54 yards in the fourth for North Pole’s last score.

North Pole’s domination also allowed Jones, a junior, to hone his passing game and he threw for a season-high 103 yards and three touchdowns — 8 and 26-yarders to Mike Flenniken in the third quarter and a 5-yard strike to Trevor McCumby late in the second quarter.

“I was glad to hit my receivers because they haven’t gotten the ball (a lot),” Jones said. “Their secondary, we picked on a little bit, but I was happy my receivers got to get the ball.”

Friday’s other games

Alaska’s hungriest football team enjoyed a long-awaited feast Friday.

Eagle River, a three-year-old high school salivating for its first victory in school history, snapped a 19-game losing streak in a big way by trouncing the Skyview Panthers 45-7 in Soldotna.

The nonconference victory was the first in four games this season for the Wolves of the Cook Inlet Conference. It improves their all-time record to 1-19.

The 44 points were more than Eagle River scored in its three previous games — during which the Wolves were outscored 154-39. They came against a Skyview team that hasn’t won a game in three outings this season.

While the win was huge for Eagle River, the night’s biggest game was in Palmer, where the fifth-ranked Moose upset the third-ranked Crimson Bears of Juneau 34-19. The game was tied 10-10 at the half, but Palmer’s Coleman Ahrens broke loose for touchdown runs of 32 and 37 yards in the fourth quarter to carry the Moose.

Palmer moved to 3-0 in the Railbelt Conference and 4-0 on the season, while Juneau fell to 2-1 and 2-2.

In Las Vegas, Alaska’s top-ranked team — the Service Cougars — took a 24-0 beating from Bishop Gorman, last year’s Nevada Class 4A state champions. The Cougars had outscored Alaska opponents 129-18 in their first three games, but couldn’t muster a point against Bishop Gorman.

In Anchorage, Jamal Hale rushed for 115 yards and a pair of touchdowns to lead Bartlett past Chugiak 20-7. Bartlett improved to 2-2 on the season and in the Cook Inlet Conference, while Chugiak dropped to 1-2 in the conference and 1-3 overall.

The Anchorage Daily News contributed to this report.