Running wild

BERNE — Whatcha gonna do …?

Hulk Hogan’s “Real American” theme song blared from the speakers during a break in the first quarter.

The Patriots never found an answer to the Hulkster’s classic question.

The South Adams offense ran (and threw) wild on the Jay County High School football team Friday night, needing just 11 seconds for its first touchdown and racking up more than 350 yards of offense in the first half as the Starfires handed their visitors a 42-16 defeat Friday.

“That's a good football team that came out of the gate fast,” said JCHS coach Eddie Fields. “We gave up some early, so that kind of put us behind the chains …

“But I thought our kids played better in the second half.”

Tytus Lehman set the tone for SAHS (4-3, 2-2 Allen County Athletic Conference) on the opening play. He zipped around the right corner on a designed run, slicing through the Patriots’ defense untouched for a 62-yard touchdown.

“The funny part about that is, he gets so nervous for games, I wanted to run him the first play to get him tackled and get him less nervous,” said SAHS coach Grant Moser, “but he didn't get tackled.”

After forcing a three-and-out, the Starfires quickly moved 69 yards in seven plays. The bulk of the yardage came on the opening and closing plays, as Will Patterson ran 22 yards on a toss around the left end and Lehman hit Derek McKean on a 35-yard fly route up the right hash.

Wes Summersett scored on a 2-yard run that sparked the playing of “Real American,” written by Fort Recovery native Rick Derringer (born Zehringer), and then hauled in a 33-yard scoring pass from Lehman for a 28-0 lead at the end of the first quarter.

“I was really proud of our offense,” Moser said, referencing his team’s five turnovers in the previous week’s 35-7 loss to the top-ranked team in Class 2A. “Our offense was kind of embarrassed last week against Adam Central. ,,, To come out and play near perfect game with our ones offense … Tytus played a phenomenal game … passed the ball really well.”

The Patriots (2-5, 1-4 ACAC) got on the board with a 28-yard Jacoby Penrod field goal, but Lehman — he finished 11-of-14 passing for 183 yards and added 138 yards on the ground — connected with McKean again for a 6-yard score and a 35-0 lead. 

SAHS went 67 yards in just 21 seconds to set up a Manny Juarez field-goal attempt at the end of the first half, but it missed wide left. Still, those yards pushed the home team to 362 — 179 on the ground and 183 through the air — at the intermission.

Patterson (94 yards rushing) got into the scoring act with an 8-yard score in the third quarter to push the game to a running clock.

“They do a thousand things formationally, so it's hard to get ready for them,” said Fields. 

“They’ve got a bunch of weapons; they’ve got good players,” he added. “It's a semi-state football team that returned basically everybody. I mean, that is a good, good football team. And their record didn’t show how good they were.”

In addition to the loss to Adams Central, the Starfires dropped their opener to Ohio Division VII No. 1 Marion Local, which beat Fort Recovery on Friday night for its 71st consecutive victory, and undefeated Class 2A No. 8 Bluffton. 

The bright spot of the game for the Patriots was senior running back Leighton Brown, who ran for 146 yards and both of their touchdowns. He had six runs of 10 yards or more, including his 15-yard score halfway through the fourth quarter, and caught a pass for for 28 yards.

“He ran it well,” said Fields. “He ran well last week. … 

“When I came in, like I told them, ‘We’re going to run the football; we're going to stop the run.’ And we kind of got away from that with some option stuff we were doing. And we've moved back to where we're going to run it, and run it hard. And I think it makes it better on both sides.”