Fort Recovery falls to Tigers

VERSAILLES, Ohio — The Tigers scored on their opening drive.
They were ahead on the scoreboard the rest of the way.
The Fort Recovery High School football team gave up a touchdown on the first possession of the game and was not able to overcome the deficit in a 20-7 loss to the Versailles Tigers on Friday night.
It was the second loss in three games for the Division?VII No. 5 Indians, whose chance at a Midwest Athletic Conference title slipped further away. The Tribe, which finished fourth in the most recent Division?VII Region 28 computer rankings, dropped to 4-2 (2-2 MAC) with their other conference loss to Division V No. 1 Coldwater. The Tigers, meanwhile, moved to 3-3 (2-2 MAC).
Garrett Thompson of Versailles capped an eight-play, 50-yard scoring drive on the Tigers’ first possession with a 3-yard touchdown run 4 minutes, 23 seconds, into the first quarter.
Versailles pushed its lead to 14-0 in the second quarter when Aaron Mangen reached the end zone on a 16-yard run with 4:15 left to play in the half. Versailles took that advantage into the locker room at intermission.
Fort Recovery, which plays the second of back-to-back road games next week at Delphos St. John’s (4-2, 3-1 MAC), finally got on the scoreboard early in the fourth quarter when Caleb Martin completed a 4-yard pass to Jason Roessner for the Tribe’s only score. It cut the deficit to 14-7 with 8:13 to play, but the Tribe wasn’t able to muster much offense after that.
Martin, a University of Toledo commit, returned to action for the first time in three weeks after missing two games because of an appendectomy.
Versailles put the game out of reach four minutes after giving up the shutout, when quarterback Alex Wendel hit Sam Barga for a 46-yard touchdown pass.