CANAL FULTON Strong offense key in Northwest rout of Chaney
The Cowboys wore down after the first quarter.
By ERIC HAMILTON
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
CANAL FULTON -- If the Chaney High football team thought the bus ride to Canal Fulton was long, the trip home probably seemed even longer.
Aside from the first quarter, which ended with the score deadlocked at 14-14, the battle of 2003 playoff teams didn't turn out to be much of a contest.
Northwest outscored Chaney 21-7 in the second quarter and poured it on in the second half, beating the Cowboys 57-21 Friday night.
"Northwest is a very good team and their offense was unstoppable tonight," said Chaney coach Ron Berdis. "We were able to match them score for score in that first quarter, but we wore down a little bit and gave up a couple of cheap plays."
Cowboys led early
Chaney held leads of 7-0 and 14-7 in the opening quarter behind the strong running of Lamar Sykes. The senior broke loose for 138 yards in the first quarter, including a 1-yard touchdown for the Cowboys' second score of the contest.
The two-point conversion pass from Rick Hlinka to Dan Balog gave Chaney a 14-7 lead with 3:26 left in the first.
The Indians scored on their next possession on Kevin Stacy's 38-yard pass to James DeGuia on the last play of the opening stanza. That's when things started going downhill for Chaney.
Mistakes costly
Northwest scored 14 points in the next two minutes, taking advantage of two key mistakes by the Cowboys.
Ryan Wallace picked off a Hlinka pass after it was tipped by a Cowboy receiver and returned it to the Chaney 13. Four plays later, Stacy connected with Scott Weber for a 16-yard touchdown.
Ahead 21-14, Northwest went for the jugular. The Indians attempted, and recovered, an onside kick at the Chaney 44-yard line. The Indians took advantage of the opening, taking a 28-14 lead four plays later on a 25-yard pass from Stacy to Wallace.
"The interception and the onside kick were no question the turning point in this game," explained Berdis. "We needed to control the turnovers and the big special teams plays, but we gave them some cheap ones and that really put the game out of reach."
Cut deficit
After Chaney cut the deficit to 28-21 with 3:58 left in the second quarter, the Indians tacked on another score to pull ahead 35-21 at halftime.
The Cowboys ran out of gas in the second half. The Northwest offense continued to dominate the Cowboys on the ground and through the air. The Indians added three rushing touchdowns and a safety in the second half.
"I thought Lamar had a pretty nice game for us tonight, but we got behind and had to go away from what we like to do in the second half," said Berdis.
"Defensively, we have some guys not answering the call. We need to corral the guys who are performing and get better. I don't care that we fell tonight; I just want to see how we bounce back up."