DES MOINES — The Marshalltown football team got what earned and earned what it got, and for the third time this season that equation came out to a victory.

The Bobcats took a nine-point lead in the fourth quarter and withstood Des Moines East’s improbable comeback, staving off the Scarlets 29-27 on Friday night at Duke Williams Stadium.

Marshalltown improved to 3-1 with the win, withstanding turnover woes and a wild and wooly finish against an opportunistic Des Moines East squad celebrating its Homecoming.

The Scarlets (1-3) got a scoop-and-score touchdown with 3:59 remaining to get within 29-27, but the Bobcats got the defensive stand they needed to finish the roller coaster of a game on top.

“A lot of good, a lot of bad, a lot of in between,” MHS head coach Adam Goodvin said. “We’re happy, we’re going to celebrate the wins because those are hard to come by, and we’ve said that every time we get one.

“They should be proud of themselves. They completed the job and we didn’t make it easy on ourselves at times, but they did it.”

Marshalltown — Class 5A’s top rushing team — piled up 314 yards and three of its four touchdowns on the ground. The Bobcats got outgained by Des Moines East, 367-339, and overcame four turnovers to take the win.

In a game of monstrous momentum swings, the Bobcats simply had more. Des Moines East drove to the Marshalltown 1-yard-line on the opening possession of the second half before Braiden Johnson was forced to fumble, and Zak Wildman came out of the pile with the ball to put it back in the Bobcats’ hands.

On the very next play, MHS hit a home run.

Junior tailback Tyler Englund ran through a wide-open hole on the left side of the offensive line, broke a handful of tackles and outraced the Scarlets up the sideline for a 95-yard touchdown run

Leading 21-14, the Bobcat defense delivered a stop and resumed possession with 1:57 left in the third period. But the third of four lost fumbles foiled Marshalltown’s quest for a two-score lead, and Des Moines East quarterback A’monte Johnson connected with Braiden Johnson for a 29-yard touchdown pass.

A penalty pushed the Scarlets closer to the goal line on the conversion, but A’monte Johnson was held out of the end zone by the Bobcat defense to keep MHS in the lead 21-20 with 10:02 to play.

Offsetting penalties wiped out Aiden Smitherman’s 97-yard kickoff return for a touchdown, but the Bobcat offense got the job done anyway. Drake Gersema finished off a six-play, 51-yard drive with a 23-yard touchdown run, dragging defenders into the end zone over the final 10 yards.

A gutsy call by the Bobcat coaching staff got the two-point conversion on a pass from Niehouse to Kyle Smith, making it a 29-20 advantage with 6:36 to go.

“I think we just had some confidence in our guys,” Goodvin said. “This was a new two-point play that we hadn’t shown before, we’d showed the formation before and we liked the alignment.”

Des Moines East drove the ball deep into Bobcat territory before fumbling it away again, and Smith landed on the loose ball at the MHS 11 to seemingly seal the win for the Bobcats.

But as bad luck would have it, the game was far from over. Niehouse got tripped up trying to hand the ball off to Englund, and the fumbled exchange led to Braiden Johnson’s scoop-6 for a 29-27 score with 3:59 remaining.

“The bad things happened, and we asked them to put it in the rear-view mirror and they did,” Goodvin said. “I think that was the worst thing that could possibly happen there up nine at the end of the game, so it was a little extra tight there, but again, proud of our guys, their effort, and I can’t wait to continue to work with them here for the next five weeks.”

A false start penalty foiled Marshalltown’s fourth-down attempt to run out the clock, so the Bobcats punted the ball back to the Scarlets for one more chance at taking the lead.

That ended in a sack celebration as Declan Greene took down A’monte Johnson for a 6-yard loss on fourth-and-18, and Marshalltown kneeled out the remainder of the clock.

“They played really tough, and we knew they would — it’s their Homecoming,” Goodvin said of the host Scarlets. “They were a lot more physical than I kind of anticipated, so a lot of credit to them. It was a tough football game.”

Marshalltown anticipates more of the same in Week 5 when it welcomes Cedar Rapids Kennedy to Leonard Cole Field next Friday night.

“I think it just solidifies the importance of continuing to get better every single day, and we’re going to meet on Monday afternoon and hit the reset button because it’s a brand-new week,” Goodvin said. “We’re going to take it day-by-day. I told them ‘be where your feet are. Don’t look ahead, don’t look behind, because you’ve got no control over that. Our focus is right here today.”

Marshalltown 29, Des Moines East 27

Score by Quarters

MHS 14 0 7 8 — 29

DM EAST 7 7 0 13 — 27

Scoring Summary

First Quarter

MHS — Jamison Niehouse 30 run (Aaron Ordaz Zambrano kick), 9:41.

DME — Geremy Paiz 6 run (Leonel Camarena-Cruz kick), 6:29.

MHS — Kyle Smith 25 pass from Niehouse (Zambrano kick), 4:10.

Second Quarter

DME — Braiden Johnson 12 run (Camarena-Cruz kick), 2:14.

Third Quarter

MHS — Tyler Englund 95 run (Zambrano kick), 8:10.

Fourth Quarter

DME — B. Johnson 29 pass from A’monte Johnson (run failed), 10:02.

MHS — Drake Gersema 23 run (Smith pass from Niehouse), 6:36.

DME — B. Johnson 6 fumble return (Camarena-Cruz kick), 3:59.

Team Statistics

MHS DME

First downs 15 19

Rushes-yards 40-314 40-196

Passing yards 25 171

Comp-Att-Int 1-2-0 14-22-0

Total Offense 42-339 62-367

Fumbles-lost 4-4 3-3

Penalties-yards 7-55 7-40

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING — MHS: Englund 18-185, Niehouse 7-61, Gersema 5-48, Aiden Smitherman 3-23, Gaston Feras 2-8, Jacob Hayes 1-(minus-6), TEAM 4-(minus-5); DME: Robbie Sykes 14-77, A. Johnson 12-60, Paiz 9-42, B. Johnson 5-17.

PASSING — MHS: Niehouse 1-2-25-0; DME: A. Johnson 14-22-171-0.

RECEIVING — MHS: Smith 1-25; DME: B. Johnson 8-98, Malik Williams 2-38, Jayvion Hanson 2-19, Jamel Heliman 2-16.