By Nicholas Huenefeld
Special to the Sentinel-Tribune
MILLBURY — Eastwood used a big-play offense and a stifling defense that came through in opportune moments to produce a 42-0 win over Lake on Friday.
“I thought the kids played great,” Eastwood head coach Sam Cotterman said. “I’m sure we made some mistakes that we’ll see (on film review), but that’s a good football team.
“They moved the ball on us pretty well and the fact our defense didn’t break and got our first shutout of the year is pretty exciting, especially against a team like Lake.”
Cam Schumaker finished off a five-play drive on the game’s opening possession with a 37-yard touchdown run.
Lake’s offense then marched 50 yards over 14 plays on the ensuing possession, but Andre Lewis blocked a 30-yard field goal attempt to give the ball back to the Eagles, who promptly went 83 yards on eight plays in under three minutes as Drew Luidhart found Connor Norton for a nine-yard touchdown and a 14-0 lead.
In total, Eastwood (4-0) amassed 415 yards over 44 plays on offense, and they needed just 18:28 to do so, averaging 9.4 yards per play and 51.9 per drive.
“We executed really poorly offensively,” Lake head coach Lane Bishop said. “We had a little success running the ball, but we didn’t execute enough. Defensively we didn’t tackle, and we had too many breakdowns on special teams. We weren’t very good in all three facets.”
Brock Messinger intercepted Lake’s Carter Behlmer on the game’s next possession, but the Flyers responded with one of their own as Andrew Fife corralled a batted pass attempt from Luidhart.
“We made some mistakes tonight,” Cotterman said. “We didn’t get some hands down. We had some tipped balls. We don’t like that. So we kind of stopped ourselves. We’ll correct that on film and be ready to go for next week.”
Fife’s play, which came on a third and three from Lake’s 15-yard line, helped give his team some momentum as the Flyers picked up three first downs on the ensuing drive, highlighted by a 18-yard reception from Gavin Kohlhofer on a third-and-five.
With Lake (2-2) facing a second and nine at Eastwood’s 33 with less than two minutes left in the half and a chance to make it a one-possession game, Schumaker intercepted Behlmer and streaked 68 yards for a touchdown. The return was called back for an illegal block in the back, but the damage was done.
“He’s just a playmaker,” Cotterman said of Schumaker. “We’re going to continue to get better at defending the pass game and those linebackers are doing a great job for us.”
On two of Lake’s first three drives, the Flyers accumulated 26 plays for 109 yards, but had nothing to show for it.
“I think we rushed the ball pretty well and moved the ball in the air when we needed to,” Bishop said. “We were probably inside their 40 four or five times and never came away with any points because of mental mistakes and too many miscues. We had a lot of mistakes tonight, and it made a difference.”
After Schumaker’s pick, Luidhart responded for Eastwood as the junior quarterback went 5-for-5 in a two-minute scenario, finishing off a 1:28 drive in six plays with a 13-yard strike to Dayquan Oliver, who spun off multiple tackles inside the five on the way to the endzone.
“We started off running the ball pretty well, but they started packing the box and doing some good things to stop the run,” Cotterman said. “We have some dudes that we feel can make some big plays and they did that tonight. I can’t say it’s a surprise because we expect that out of those guys.”
In the second half, Eastwood’s defense took over, limiting the Flyers to just 88 yards on 24 plays, and 21 of those yards came on a meaningless scamper in the final seconds.
The Eagles forced four consecutive turnovers on downs from Lake in the half, including three with the minimum number of plays.
Perhaps the biggest play of the half defensively for Eastwood came on the first possession as Lake’s Brett Bomyea got past his defender inside Eastwood’s 20, but the ball was batted away at the last second.
“We had two messed-up plays where our heads weren’t in the game in the first half,” Schumaker said. “We thought we should have been up more, so we came back in the second half wanting to make a statement. I feel like we did that.”
Despite having to produce the game’s only punt on their first possession of the second half, Eastwood’s big-play offense went to work and racked up three consecutive touchdowns to put the game away.
Luidhart found Andre Lewis for a 66-yard touchdown with 2:57 left in the third. Lewis broke several tackles on the play before sprinting the final 30 yards. The next offensive drive needed just one play as Kevin Lewis went 38 yards on the ground for a 35-0 lead.
Eastwood’s lone fourth-quarter possession witnessed Luidhart sneak it in from one-yard out, completing a 10-play, 38-yard drive in just over six minutes.
Kevin Lewis toted the ball seven times for 22 yards on the final drive to finish with a game-best 100 yards. Schumaker also chipped in 58 yards as the duo combined for 158 of Eastwood’s 165 yards on the ground.
“We did pretty well today,” Kevin Lewis said. “Even when it got hard, we kept going. We knew coming in they were going to be a tough team to run the ball against, so we knew we had to play hard.”
Luidhart finished 13-for-18 with 237 yards through the air for Eastwood, who got game-bests in receptions (6) and yards (72) from Andre Lewis. Oliver added three catches for 34 yards, while Kevin Lewis corralled one pass for 26 yards.
“We take it one week at a time,” Cotterman said. “We have a big one next week against a very improved (Maumee) team that’s coming into our house, and they’ll be hungry. We have to be ready to go.”
Behlmer was 14-of-24 for 110 yards for Lake with four receptions apiece for Kohlhofer and Bomyea. Kohlhofer led the team with 40 yards receiving, and Jay Blazevich chipped in three catches for 36 yards.
“I think that when you play a team like that the margin is so small,” Bishop said. “When we’re trying to climb that hill against a team like Eastwood, we have to make every one of those 50/50 plays, and I don’t think we made one tonight.
“Credit to Eastwood. They made a lot of really good plays. They have tough kids, great athletes, and they’re probably one of the better teams we’ll play all year. They handle business.”
