Mikes honor coaching legacy, then rout Eagles
Carmichaels headlined the action in Greene County in Week Four, as the Mikes picked up a 47-13 victory over Avella last Friday.
During halftime, the Mikes celebrated their coaches throughout their storied history with a presentation and renamed their football field at the high school “Coaches Field.”
Since 1923, Carmichaels has only had nine coaches.
Those coaches includes Harry McHenry (1923-24), Darwin P. Venen (1925-44), Al Cree (1945-1953), Fred Stuvek (1954-1968), Vic Lapkowicz (1969-1978), Tom McCombs (1979-1988), John Menhart (1988-2002, 2009-12), Mike Bosnic (2003-08) and Ryan Krull (2013-present).
Tailback Nick Mundell started the scoring for the Mikes (3-1, 3-0) with a 45-yard scoring run, followed by a pair of touchdown passes from quarterback Kevin Kelly, to Nate Broadwater (two yards) and Chad Ruse (45 yards).
After a touchdown by Avella, Carmichaels responded with three unanswered scores, courtesy of an 82-yard kickoff return by Ruse, a 65-yard touchdown pass to Dylan Wilson from Kelly and a 14-yard scoring toss to Garrett Ponick.
The teams totaled two touchdowns in the final 12 minutes after a scoreless third quarter.
West Greene, playing without injured quarterback Zach Pettit, shut out Jefferson-Morgan last week, 18-0, in the county’s lone intra-county match-up.
“It was definitely a difficult week for us,” West Greene coach Rodney Huffman said. “To tell you the truth, we didn’t practice well the whole week. I was very concerned about tonight. Sometimes you practice good during the week and you have a terrible game, but sometimes you practice bad and you can pull out a win. We’ll take the ugly win. My hat off to the defense and the defensive coaches.”
This was the first shutout by the Pioneers (4-1, 3-1) since a 30-0 triumph over Vincentian Academy in 2012. The defense limited the passing game by J-M with three interceptions.
The Rockets (1-4, 0-2) trailed 12-0 at the end of one after the visitors tallied touchdowns via a 20-yard pass to Isaac Courtwright from Gavin Scott and a four-yard run by Ben Jackson.
Jackson led West Greene on the ground with 147 yards. The Pioneers final touchdown came in the early stages of the fourth frame with a three-yard rushing touchdown by Nathan Brudnock.
“Ben is a tough runner,” Huffman said. “Ben is going to go for you any week and he carried us on offense tonight. It wasn’t a flashy 200-plus yard performance like he is capable of, but he got us those tough yards and was able to move the sticks tonight.”
Colten Davidson gained 72 yards on the ground for the Rockets.
“Inconsistencies and missed opportunities killed us on offense,” J-M coach Aaron Giorgi said. “We couldn’t finish drives off. We basically had the ball the whole entire third quarter and couldn’t punch it in. We had too many costly penalties. I did really like our overall effort on defense.”
Waynesburg Central continued its losing skid with a 21-6 setback to Yough on the road last week.
The Raiders (0-4, 0-4) fell behind 13-0 at halftime and Yough added a touchdown early in the fourth.
Waynesburg avoided the shutout with a one-yard plunge into the end zone by Caleb Shriver, who led the Raiders on the ground with 60 yards on 22 carries.
Quarterback Dylan Scritchfield threw for 96 yards on 9-of-19 passing.
Mapletown had no answer for the potent offense of California last Friday, as the Maples fell 63-8 against one the best teams in Class A this season.
“There’s not a doubt in my mind they’re one of the top five teams in Class A,” Mapletown coach George Messich said. “You look at most schools in Class A, they maybe have one or two kids who are really special athletes. California has one of the best power backs I’ve seen in 30 years, their defense is loaded with speed, they can throw the ball, and their receivers can fly.”
The Trojans amounted 496 yards on offense and six different players scored a touchdown.
Cal put up 28 points in opening 12 minutes of action and held a 49-0 lead at halftime.
Sandwiched around two second half touchdowns by the Trojans was a 56-yard touchdown run by Dylan Rush for the Maples (2-3, 1-2).
Ron Burkholder-Walter scored the two-point conversion run for the visitors.
With the touchdown, Rush still leads the Herald-Standard Touchdown Club race with 110 points.
Headlining Week Five action tonight is Carmichaels at Mapletown and Jefferson-Morgan at Avella. Both games are set to kickoff at 7 p.m. and both will be broadcast on greenesports.net.
West Greene travels to Fort Cherry tonight at 7 while Waynesburg hosts Southmoreland in Interstate Conference action, also at 7.
The Waynesburg University football team played under the lights in Ohio last Saturday, but fell to Presidents’ Athletic Conference foe Case Western Reserve 56-21.
Sophomore quarterback Tyler Perone threw for 181 yards on 18-of-32 passing with three touchdowns and one interception. JaWaun Jones caught two of those touchdown passes, while Chad Walker had the other scoring grab for the Yellow Jackets (0-4, 0-2).
Austin Wilson led Waynesburg in rushing (15 carries for 69 yards) and receiving (six catches for 47 yards). VaShon Graham registered a team-high 10 tackles, while Brent Blacharczyk had an interception.
The Yellow Jackets will look to pick up their first win for coach Chris Smithley this Saturday, as Waynesburg hosts Grove City (1-3, 1-1) for a PAC clash at John F. Wiley Stadium. Kickoff is slated for 1:30 p.m.