Saturday, September 19, 2009 1:48 AM CDT
State-ranked Casey too much for Cumberland
By MIKE MONAHAN, Staff Writer
mmonahan@jg-tc.com
TOLEDO -- Casey-Westfield led Cumberland 17-0 at halftime of Friday’s Little Illini Conference football game.
The Pirates then moved into Casey territory on their opening drive of the second half when Seth Brewer picked off a pass and returned it 57 yards for a touchdown and the No. 4 Class 2A team went on to win 38-7.
“The quarterback had an open receiver and he just threw it right past the receiver,” said Brewer, who had his first interceptions of the season and had two in one game for the first time in his career.
“I ended up catching it and I had a lot of great blocks in front of me and got to where I had to go.”
Brewer set up the Warriors’ first touchdown with a 48-yard kickoff return. Casey, which had five of its seven drives start inside the Pirate 45, converted two third down plays and a fourth and one from the Pirate five to keep the drive alive.
Billy Seeley, who finished with 56 yards on 17 carries, got the first down on a 3-yard run and Austin Ragsdale took it over on the next play. Clinton Scott, who made all five extra points, tacked on his first for a 7-0 lead.
Casey’s next drive was set up by a 14-yard punt. Brewer caught an 18-yard pass and on fourth and goal from the five scored to cap the 34-yard drive. Scott’s extra point made it 14-0.
“I fell down a little bit, but ended up making it,” said Brewer who fought his way into the end zone for the final yard.
The Pirates put together their best drive of the opening half marching from their own 20 (best starting drive was its own 28) picking up 17 yards on a pass play to Clay Wilson and quarterback Cole Miller kept the drive alive with a 2-yard run on a fourth and one. Casey’s defense forced a fourth and six from the Warrior 25 and the pass was incomplete.
Brewer’s first interception of the game was returned nine yards to the Pirate 17 and three incomplete passes later, Scott booted a 34-yard field goal for the 17 point advantage.
Casey drove inside the Cumberland 20 every possession with an average starting drive of the Pirate 41.
“Time of possession was very good tonight and I think that was something we had to do,” said Casey coach Keith Sinclair.
“We had to try and take them out of their running game a little bit and get them into a throwing position a little more often. By getting the lead and ball control I thought it worked well for us.”
Sinclair was pleased with the play of Seeley and Chris Unzicker and Brewer.
“We are getting more and more kids involved,” said Sinclair.” Our tight ends are excellent receivers too and helped us out on drives. We are trying to make it a total team effort on offense and our defense did a great job. They played pretty solid defense all night. Silas Gabel is a great runner and Cole Miller is a good quarterback and I totally expect them to be in the playoff again.”
Cumberland’s average starting drive was its own 19. The Pirates finished with 187 yards of total offense compared to 237 for Casey.
“On their fourth down play for the touchdown we went to a cover two over the top and they beat us underneath,” said Cumberland coach Todd Butler. “You give a good team short fields they are going to capitalize and Casey made very few mistakes.
“Defensively we played a very good game. We played with our backs to the goal line all night; give Casey credit though they got a good return and forced a shaky punt. The score doesn’t look like it, but defensively I don’t think we played terrible.”
Cumberland’s only score occurred on the final drive of the game, an 80-yard drive that took 4:33 and culminated with a 3-yard run by Silas Gabel, who finished with 142 yards on 27 carries.
The Pirates could have Braden Shafer back next week (he has been out with a broken collar bone) and Adam Markwell could be back week eight (he is out with a strained knee ligament).
“Offensively, we started deep in our own territory and that allowed Casey’s defense to be more aggressive and that created problems for us up front,” said Butler. “Silas Gabel has had to shoulder the load rushing and did a great job.”
Jamin Repp and Gabel led Cumberland in tackles with 15 and 14 respectively, while Cole Carlen had 12.
Josh Thais and Dalton Brooke led the Warriors defense with 10 and eight tackles respectively.
Casey, 4--0 overall and in the conference, is to play host to Edwardsville Metro East-Lutheran at 7:30 p.m. Friday in a non-conference contest.
Cumberland, 2-2 overall and in the LIC, is to play host to Palestine-Hutsonville Friday in another conference game.
Contact Mike Monahan at mmonahan@jg-tc.com or 238-6854,
Casey 14 3 14 7 —38
Cumberland 0 0 0 7 —7
First quarter
CW-Austin Ragsdale 1 run (Clinton Scott kick) 6:03
CW-Seth Brewer 5 pass from Brett Livvix (Scott kick) :38.8
Second quarter
CW-Scott 34 field goal 3.0
Third quarter
CW-Brewer 57 interception return (Scott kick) 9:21
CW-Billy Seeley 4 run (Scott kick) 5:16
Fourth quarter
CW-Ajaye Meeks 2 run (Scott kick) 4:39
C-Silas Gabel 3 run (Brendon Ritchie kick) 0:00
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
Rushing
CW-Brett Livvix 5-3; Chris Unzicker 2-7; Billy Seeley 17-56; Austin Ragsdale 4-15, TD; Colin Carver 2-22; Josh Thais 1-5; Ajaye Meeks 2-5, TD; Totals 33-113, 2 TDs
C-Cole Miller 7-6; Silas Gabel 27-142, TD; Cole Carlen 6-12; Clay Wilson 1-2; Totals 41-162, TD
Passing
CW-Livvix 10-18-0-106, TD; Heath Huisinga 1-2-0-23, 0TDs; Totals 11-20-0-129, TD
C-Miller 5-10-2-25, 0 TDs
Receiving
CW-Seth Brewer 5-56, TD; Unzicker 4-40; Clinton Scott 1-10; Ethan Blankenship 1-23; Totals 11-129, TD
C-Gabel 3-3; Wilson 1-17; Jaton McMechan 1-5; Totals 5-25
Add your comments
Not already registered?
Then click Here.
Comment policy:
JG-TC.com encourages readers to engage in civil conversation with their neighbors. Comments that are submitted are not posted to the site immediately. They go into a queue to be moderated and may take several hours to be reviewed. Comments posted on Saturday may not be reviewed until Sunday afternoon.
In order to keep the page a set width, long lines (mostly long links) will be chopped. Try putting spaces in your links or consider using tinyurl.com to make a smaller link that you can include.
We will never edit or alter your comments, but we do reserve the right to remove comments that violate our code of conduct.
No comment may contain:
* Potentially libelous statements; such as accusing somebody of a crime, defamation of character, or statements that can harm somebody's reputation.
* Obscene, explicit, or racist language.
* Personal attacks, insults, threats, harassment or inciting violence.
* Commercial product promotions.
If you have any questions, please contact our moderator.
|
|
|
|
|
