WEST UNITY, Ohio — Behind 614 yards rushing, Northwood improved to 5-4 with a 41-18 Toledo Area Athletic Conference victory over host Hilltop Friday.
The Rangers garnered 276 yards on the ground the first half and added 336 in the second half, led by Jason St. Claire, who ran for 277 yards on 18 carries and two touchdowns.
Tyler Osley ran for 176 yards on 10 carries and two TDs and Julien Chappell ran for 110 yards on 21 carries and two TDs. Luke Szekeres had 40 yards rushing on nine carries and Lucas Rowland had a carry for 11 yards for the Rangers.
However, Hilltop made the game interesting by keeping it close late in the first half.
Northwood got two first quarter TDs on a 14-yard pass from Osley to St. Claire and Chappell scored on a one-yard with one minute remaining in the opening quarter. Ethan Leonard booted both conversion kicks to put the Rangers up, 14-0.
But Hilltop came back with two scores of their own, first on a nine-yard pass from Cameron Shimp to Anthony Jianuzzi and then on a 10-yard run by Shimp, but failed on both conversions, trailing 14-12 with 3:32 remaining in the opening half.
The Rangers got on the board twice more before halftime — on a 20-yard run by Osley and an 81-yard run by St. Claire with 46 seconds remaining to take a 28-12 lead into intermission.
Chappell scored from four yards out with 5:29 remaining in the third quarter and Osley scored on an 88-yard run with 3:49 remaining in the game. Hilltop added one more TD on a six-yard run by Scott Bowers with 1:54 left in the game.
For Hilltop, Bowers had 22 carries for 144 yards, and Shimp completed 15-of-32 passes for 251 yards, but threw two interceptions.
For Hilltop, Cameron Schossler caught five passes for 98 yards, Brock Kesler caught four passes for 73 yards, Brycen Grubbs had four catches for 55 yards, and Jianuzzi had two catches for 19 yards.
Hilltop falls to 1-7 on the season. Northwood finishes out the regular season by hosting LakeVille (Mich), which is 1-7, next Friday.
