Scott Seagren 

Your Prep Sports 

DEWITT  – Overcoming early adversity was the key to Solon’s 55-2 win at Central DeWitt Friday night.

The ball wasn’t bouncing the Spartans way to start their game at Central Dewitt Friday night. The Sabers opening kickoff went into no-man’s land between the waves of the Spartan return team and was recovered by the Sabers at the Solon 24 yard line.

The Spartans defense, led by Eddie Johnson, was up to the challenge.

Johnson’s 8-yard sack and 3-yard tackle for loss on consecutive plays forced the Sabers to punt from the Solon 35 yard line.

Solon’s first offensive possession gained only 17 yards and one first down, forcing the Spartans to punt for what would be their only punt of the night.

Ty Bell’s punt pushed the Sabers back to their own 18 yard line.

From there, the Sabers would put together their biggest drive of the night.

Quarterback Hudson Krukow completed three passes for 63 yards on the drive.

The final pass of the drive was a 35-yard pass to Max Burgmeier, who raced down the Spartan sideline toward the end zone, but was caught by Cole Carney and Oliver Owens at the 3-yard line, where Carney stripped the ball loose and Karsyn Regennitter recovered for the Spartans.

The Spartans got out to the 8 yard line after two runs by Eddie Johnson, but that’s where bad luck hit the Spartans a second time in the early minutes of the game.

On third-and-eight, the snap got away from Bell and was rolling loose in the end zone.

Bell wisely swatted the ball out of the endzone for a safety, rather than risk the Sabers recovering for a touchdown.

The safety put the Sabers up 2-0 at the 5:32 mark of the first quarter and also gave them good field position after the free kick at the 50-yard line.

The Sabers would get no closer than the Spartan 32-yard line on that drive.

After a Lucas Feuerbach sack back to the 33 on third down and an incompletion on fourth down the Sabers turned the ball over to the Spartans and that’s where momentum would change.

And change it did.

The Spartans took all of 11 seconds for Eddie Johnson to reel off a 45-yard run and a 22-yard touchdown run to put the Spartans up 7-2 with 2:53 remaining in the opening quarter.

After a quick four-and-out by the Sabers, including a 4-yard tackle for loss by Cole Carney, the Sabers were forced to punt.

Maddox Kelley returned the punt 22 yards to the Central Dewitt 30.

On the first play, Cole Carney rushed around the right edge and was off to the races for a 30-yard touchdown.

On the first Spartan drive of the second quarter, Bell hit Kelley over the middle for a 57-yard touchdown strike to extend the lead to 21-2.

Later in the quarter, a Kelley interception would lead to a nine play, 61-yard drive capped off by a nine-yard touchdown pass from Bell to Regennitter, making the halftime score 28-2.

On the Spartans’ first offensive play of the second half, Johnson would take the ball up the middle for a 70-yard touchdown run, breaking four tackles on the way.

Ryan Locke’s fifth of seven extra points on the night put the Spartans up 35-2.

Later in the third quarter, Bell and Kelley would connect again for an 11 yard touchdown to get the running clock started.

On the night, Bell would find Kelley four times for 101 yards and two touchdowns.

The Spartans would tack on two more touchdowns in the 4^th quarter, as many of the Spartan starters were able to get some well-deserved rest.

Quarterback Eli Kampman led the Spartans on a six play, 63-yard drive finished off by Einar Stecher’s 2-yard run.

Kampman added a 73-yard touchdown run of his own on a quarterback keeper with 3:36 to go in the game to finish the scoring for the Spartans.

Overcoming the early adversity was critical to the Spartans’ success tonight. But once they did, there was no looking back as the Spartans answered that early 2-0 deficit with 55 unanswered points behind the senior leadership of Bell, Johnson, and Carney, with key contributions from younger players like Lucas Feuerbach, Kyler Jensen, Eli Kampman and many others.

The entire roster was able to contribute to the win.

After the game, head coach Lucas Stanton commented on the Spartans overcoming the early adversity.

“I think we finished well but obviously can’t start like that in future games,” Stanton said. “Top ranked teams will take advantage of those mistakes and make us pay. Whether it was self-induced or not I was happy with our response to adversity in the first quarter and we showed some resilience which will serve us well in the coming weeks.”

Johnson finished the night with 16 carries for 203 yards and 2 touchdowns in less than three quarters of work.

He also added four tackles, three of those behind the line of scrimmage, including the two big stops early in the game.

“I think that we started pretty rough and I was trying to get things going for our team on the defensive side,” Johnson said.

Regarding his huge rushing night, Johnson added, “I just trusted the line and hoped for things to open up. Overall it was a good game for the team and I thought we handled the adversity well.”

Bell continued his great start to the season leading an efficient Spartan offense.

Bell completed 12-of-14 passes, a remarkable 86% completion rate, for 146 yards and three touchdowns.

Bell was able to spread the ball around to seven different Spartan receivers.

Like a true leader, Bell was quick to praise the entire team.

“We have no problem spreading the ball around because we have so many different guys that can make plays,” Bell said. “I trust every single guy out on that field to go out and make a play for our team. And of course, it all starts with the o-line. Can’t go 12-14 without having enough time to throw so huge credit to those guys.”

Carney was a beast on both sides of the ball.

In addition to his strong running (35 yards and a touchdown), Carney was in on eight tackles including, three tackles for loss.

Kyler Jensen led the Spartans with 10 tackles, including three for loss.

Lucas Feuerbach also had two tackles for loss on a night when the Spartan defense stopped the Sabers behind the line of scrimmage 12 times.

The Sabers never once took a snap inside the red zone.

It was a dominating performance on both sides of the ball as the Spartans cruised to a 55-2 victory and look forward to returning home for the annual rivalry game against Mount Vernon (3-0).

This year’s game looks to be extra special with both teams ranked in the top 3 in Class 3A.

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