Mt. Pleasant uses big third quarter to down Yough
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Friday, September 6, 2019 | 10:51 PM
Yough’s CJ Waldier leaps to catch a pass against Mt. Pleasant on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Yough’s CJ Waldier reaches for a pass near the end zone but is broken up by Mt. Pleasant defense on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Mt. Pleasant’s Nick Loughner runs the ball past Yough defense to score for Mt. Pleasant on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Mt. Pleasant Vikings enter the field to take on Yough on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Mt. Pleasant ball carrier Jacob Johnson looks for an opening against Yough defense on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Mt. Pleasant ball carrier Jacob Johnson drops for the yardage against Yough on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Yough’s quarterback Gamal Marballie throws the first touchdown pass of the game against Mt. Pleasant on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Mt. Pleasant defense Donovan Bair (25) leaps to tackle Yough ball carrier CJ Waldier on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Players with Yough get pumped up after a huddle between warmups on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Mt. Pleasant players practice drills during warmups before kickoff against Yough on Friday night, Sept. 6, 2019 at Mt. Pleasant Area High School.
Mt. Pleasant scored 28 unanswered points in the third quarter to roar to a 55-35 victory over Yough on Friday night
The win lifts Mt. Pleasant (2-1) to 1-0 in conference games. Yough (1-2) fell to 1-1 in the Big East.
“We can’t have penalties – and I don’t care how close they call them – and we can’t have turnovers,” Vikings coach Jason Fazekas said. “They played us tough, which we expected them to do, but we let it get away from us in the first half.
“The third quarter, that’s how we have to do it. That’s more like I’d like to see us play all the time.”
The Vikings marched 95 yards after taking the second half kickoff, with quarterback Asher O’Connor hitting running back Jake Johnson on a 61-yard pass to put Mt. Pleasant ahead for good with 9 minutes, 24 seconds left in the third quarter.
Yough fumbled its first snap after that and Jonas King recovered for Mt. Pleasant. Nick Louchner ran it in from 18 yards out and the Vikings’ lead swelled to 28-14 with 9:01 to go.
It took four minutes for Mt. Pleasant to score again. Aaron Alakson did the honors on a 1-yard run to boost Mt. Pleasant’s lead to 35-14 with 4:58 left in the quarter.
Just for good measure, Jacob Fazekas blocked a Yough punt in the end zone and Ken Biller recovered with 3:32 to go in the third.
“I guess you could say the wheels fell on there in the third quarter,” Yough coach Scott Wood said. “Really, I think they wanted it more than we did. They have size on their offensive line and they used it to their advantage. It killed us.”
Mt. Pleasant rode that size up front to produce a trio of 100-yard rushers. Johnson ran for 130 on 12 carries, Lochner added 124 on seven attempts and Alakson ran 12 times for 118. That trio combined for seven touchdowns.
The Cougars refused to simply go away, as Yough scored three times in the fourth quarter. C.J. Waldier returned a kickoff 97 yards for one score, quarterback Gamal Marballie ran for a 13-yard touchdown and John Waller, a 5-foot-7, 150-pound freshman, scored on a 5-yard pass from Marballie to cap the scoring.
“These guys are never going to quit,” Wood said. “Never. We haven’t quit in a game this year and I don’t think we ever will.”
Tags: Mt. Pleasant, Yough
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