But head coach Dan Oliver said it’s the Lancers’ defense that’s setting up many of those points by forcing turnovers or giving the offense good field position to start drives. St. Pius has surrendered just eight points per game during its winning streak and the Lancers are 6-1 going into Friday night’s homecoming I-55 Conference game against winless Crystal City (0-7).
On Friday night in Perryville, St. Pius scored a touchdown in each quarter and beat St. Vincent 30-6 to improve to 4-0 in the conference. Valle Catholic is also 6-1 and 4-0 and hosts the Lancers in Ste. Genevieve on Oct. 25 to decide who’s king of the road in the I-55. Faron Young, eat your heart out.
Defensive coach Tilden Watson’s defense has been playing so well, it was suggested to Oliver that it needs a nickname. “Tilden’s terrors” or “Watson’s whackers” was suggested. Oliver liked both choices.
“More than anything our defense has been playing outstanding,” Oliver said. “In the first half, St. Vincent didn’t have but two first downs.”
St. Pius President Jim Lehn’s son, defensive back Jonathan Lehn, has sticky hands. Lehn, a senior defensive back, had two interceptions and returned one for a touchdown in a 41-0 drubbing of Herculaneum. He had two more picks against St. Vincent.
“He’s a quiet guy and everybody knows about (senior) Josh Ruble on the other side, so I guess teams think they can pick on Jon,” Oliver said.
Senior Riley Naeger is a 6-7 guided missile at safety. Teams can’t throw over the top on Naeger, who’s the school’s best basketball player. He has three interceptions on the year, including one against the Indians, and he recovered a fumble against St. Vincent too. On the interception, Naeger scooped the ball that bounced off an Indian in what Oliver described as a turning point.
“When he recovered the fumble, thank goodness he’s 6-7,” Oliver said. “He reached out and pulled in the fumble and that was another momentum-stopping play.”
Against the Indians, the Lancers’ defensive front swarmed and hit with zeal. St. Vincent tried to run at senior defensive end Noah Lampros until it realized it was pointless and stopped doing it altogether. St. Pius was missing its other end on defense, senior Patrick Argana, who was out for personal reasons, but it didn’t matter. Argana has 11 tackles for a loss this season. Junior linebacker Connor Hardin sacked the St. Vincent quarterback three times.
“Our first-string defense has allowed just two touchdowns (during the winning streak),” Oliver said.
Since Shjon Meyer was moved to center early in the season, the St. Pius offensive line has been at the top of its game.
“We had him at guard early in the season, but he’s a better fit for us at center,” Oliver said. “He’s helped in our resurgence.”
Sophomore Tommy Schweigert plays right guard and he had some good games early, then was injured for a couple of weeks and now is back into form. Right tackle Zander Parson was mired in a sophomore slump in the middle of the year, but he’s learning on the job. He’s 6-5, 270 and he can run.
“When he does that, everybody’s job is a lot easier,” Oliver said.
Argana, Jackson Wyciskalla-Webb, Jackson Hall and Tristan Jacobson complete the offensive line.
Skill-wise, there’s plenty for Oliver to like and opponents to fear. Naeger draws so much attention because of his size and playmaking ability that it’s leaving senior receiver Josh Ruble plenty of room to feast on secondaries. Ruble opened the scoring against the Indians with a 46-yard touchdown reception from senior Noah Lampros on a halfback pass. Ruble finished with four catches for 145 yards, a staggering 36 yards per catch.
Senior quarterback Carson Fischer completed 10 of 18 passes for 168 yards and threw an interception against the Indians. For the season, Fischer has completed 43-of-77 passes for 800 yards and 11 scores.
“Riley’s been drawing a lot of attention and Carson’s been clicking along,” Oliver said. “We missed the right side of our line against Herculaneum and got them back against Cuba where they chipped off some rust and Carson’s been clean for two games. When he’s able to find his second and third receiver, it makes it easier to convert those third downs.”
Sophomore running back Nate Ruble capped the scoring against St. Vincent with a 45-yard TD jaunt in the fourth quarter. Ruble finished with 180 yards on 20 carries.
Oliver said he won’t have to remind his team not to take the Hornets lightly and look ahead to ferocious Valle, which held off the Lancers 34-26 last season.
The Warriors have never lost an I-55 game.
“Part of it is we want to make sure we play at our best,” Oliver said. “We want to get better. We want to worry about us and not worry about who’s coming up. Anytime you get the opportunity to maximize your district points, you want to do that. We’re scouting Crystal like we do everyone else. It’s a local game. The guys have been motivated all year to play well.
“I’ve looked at Valle film this year. They’re a good team with a good record. It’s a trap game this week if we don’t focus on Crystal.”
Tigers mount amazing rally
Nothing went right in the first half for Festus in its homecoming game against Pacific on Friday night.
The Tigers trailed the Indians 25-0 at the break. Festus head coach Russ Schmidt was going to watch the halftime festivities but there was too much coaching to do in the expanded halftime. So his coaches got to work. There wasn’t any fire and brimstone to wake up his team that seemed to be more focused on Saturday night’s dance than the business at hand.
“I don’t know how to explain it,” Schmidt said. “Even our headsets weren’t working from the box to the field. We had a 20-minute halftime. It wasn’t a rant session. We made our halftime adjustments and told them they could continue to play like that and lose their homecoming game. The seniors took that and turned around a football game. Credit the kids.”
The Tigers played with urgency and emotion and turned a 25-point deficit into a 35-32 victory in what Schmidt believes was their biggest comeback in a decade.
Pacific got the ball first in the second half, but instead of increasing its lead to the point of no return, Festus stopped it on three-and-out and got the ball back at midfield. Sturdy senior fullback Jack Robinson scored from 4 yards with 8:41 left in the third and the comeback was in full swing.
“We went down and scored and you could see the groundswell coming,” Schmidt said.
Sophomore running back Dalten Yates was next in the end zone for the Tigers. When the season began, Yates was an afterthought in the backfield, but injuries pushed him forward and he scored on a run from 21 yards to make the score 25-14. Senior Austin Coale replaced Ryan Esparza at kicker on Friday and made all five PATs. Coale also had an interception that led to a TD.
Junior Collin Doyel started the season at QB, but Schmidt moved him to wingback when injuries depleted his backfield. Doyel scored the Tigers’ last three TDs – on two 10-yard runs and a 63-yard gallop to complete the comeback. Doyel averaged 21 yards on just six carries for 126 yards.
After each TD, Doyel was the holder for Coale on the extra points. Following his longest TD run, Doyel was out of gas. Coale knew it. What happened next is emblazoned in Schmidt’s mind.
“Austin paused Collin for a moment and let him catch his breath and said, ‘Let’s go do this.’ I watched that and that’s another leadership example of Austin’s.”
Jefferson RB scores four TDs
Jefferson’s defense limited Grandview to 67 total yards – 44 were surrendered by junior varsity players in the fourth quarter – and beat the host Eagles 48-7 on Friday.
Head coach Alex Rouggly said it was the Blue Jays’ best performance for four quarters this season and they improved to 3-4 overall and 3-2 in the I-55 Conference. Grandview won its first game in four years two weeks ago, but couldn’t sustain that momentum and fell to 1-6 and 1-3.
“Our kids came out with a sense of urgency and played exactly like that,” Rouggly said. “Our offensive and defensive lines controlled the line of scrimmage for all four quarters, which was something we had preached all week. Our skilled players stepped up and had a great game.”
Junior running back Dylan Schnitzler scored five touchdowns for Jefferson. In the first quarter, he had a 36-yard touchdown reception from sophomore quarterback Drew Breeze and a 2-yard TD run. In the second, Schnitzler had TD runs of 19 and 14 yards, and in the third he had an 18-yard yard run. The Blue Jays rushed for 248 yards and Schnitzler had 82.
Breeze replaced starting QB Colton Richardson, who missed the game with an injury.
“And (Breeze) commanded our offense like he had been doing it all season,” Rouggly said.
Junior Colby Ott scored Jefferson’s other two touchdowns – a rushing TD from 23 yards in the first and a 53-yard interception return in the second.
Juniors Dawson Jakoubek and Justin Mitchell led the Blue Jays with eight solo tackles. Jakoubek, a linebacker, leads his team with 88 solo tackles and eight for a loss.
Jefferson wraps up the regular season with road games at Chaffee and at I-55 rival St. Vincent.
“Our young men continue to get better each week. We are excited to see what the future holds for our kids,” Rouggly said.