Joe Kline / The Bulletin Summits John Bledsoe runs the ball upfield during the first half on Friday night at Bend High School.

For a number of years, Summit football has gone overlooked by opponents.

Joe Padilla knows this. But, the Storm coach quickly added, “this isn’t same old Summit.”

Case in point: Behind 473 yards of total offense on Friday night, including 344 yards through the air by quarterback John Bledsoe, the Storm powered to a 40-13 Intermountain Conference victory at Bend High — their second consecutive win over the Lava Bears after dropping eight straight.

Sometimes you ask for respect, Padilla told his team after the game, and other times you earn it.

The new Summit, Padilla concluded, earned it Friday night.

“It meant a lot,” said Summit running back Sean Kent, who racked up 132 yards rushing and two touchdowns on just nine carries. “We wanted to come out here and prove something. I think we did tonight.”

Throughout the season, the Storm had been searching for offensive consistency. Against Bend, they found it as Bledsoe completed 22 of 28 passes for four touchdowns to help Summit outgain the Lava Bears 473-273.

“This was it,” Padilla said, adding how difficult that consistency makes Summit to defend. “We cause some problems for people because we have a lot of athletes on the field.

“We’re not the biggest team out there, but when we’re playing fast and when we’re playing hard, we’re a good football team.”

Not the biggest, indeed, as shown by Kent — a 5-foot-6-inch, 150-pound running back who broke off scoring runs of 58 and 53 yards in the second half. Athletes, Summit has, as displayed by wideout Kyle Cornett, who hauled in seven passes for 147 yards and two touchdowns.

A year after the Storm’s controversial three-point win at home against the Lava Bears, Summit put all those pieces together on Friday night to secure a third straight win. And while Padilla, well aware that this matchup was circled on Bend’s calendar, emphasized that his team’s focus remains only on each week’s opponent, Kent had a different take.

“That was big motivation,” Kent said. “From that victory last year, there was some controversy. We knew this year it was going to be a fight. We had to come out and play our best.”

Summit, ranked No. 9 in Class 5A, did just that, scoring 20 straight points and answering each Bend score in the Storm’s final IMC game of the season to improve to 3-1 in league play and 6-2 overall.

“We just didn’t make enough plays to win,” said Lava Bears coach Matt Craven. “They made some big plays, and that’s what kind of team we saw them on film as being — a big-play team. They’ve got some fantastic speed on the perimeter, and that showed tonight. That was tough for us to control.”

Hunter McDonald paced No. 11 Bend (2-1 IMC, 5-3 overall) with 117 yards rushing, while quarterback Creighton Simmonds passed for 139 yards and two touchdowns, one each to Chris Wallace and Quinn Fettig.

Wallace’s 59-yard catch and run in the third quarter pulled the Lava Bears to within 13 points, but it was answered late in the same period by Kent’s 58-yard sprint. Early in the fourth quarter, Simmonds connected with Fettig for a 3-yard score. Again, however, Summit answered, this time with Cornett’s 12-yard touchdown reception. A 53-yard scoring run by Kent sealed the victory for the Storm.

“This is a different crew, this is a different mentality, this is a different work ethic,” Padilla said of his squad. “These are the guys who have worked out five days a week every morning for nine months, getting it done, knowing we have to outwork people. That’s really what it’s come down to.”

Bend limited the visitors to just 129 yards rushing, even with the noteworthy performance of Kent. In Craven’s mind, the Lava Bears defended the run “pretty dang well.” But, he continued, “we got big-played, which is what (Summit) has done to most teams they’ve played.”

“That was something we were trying to contain,” Craven said. “But they did it to us as well because that’s the forte of that team — team speed.”

As the Storm prepare to host North Salem in a nonleague game next Friday, the Lava Bears entertain second-ranked Mountain View in the annual Civil War game. A Bend victory over the Cougars would create a three-way tie atop the IMC standings heading into the state playoffs.

“These guys, they’ve worked really hard, and they know they have a chance to knot everything up in the IMC,” Craven said of the Lava Bears. “That’s going to be our goal next Friday night, and we’re going to work hard to achieve that goal. These guys are going to put in their best effort, as they do every night.”

—Reporter: 541-383-0307, glucas@bendbulletin.com.