John Marshall Routs Oak Glen
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MOUNDSVILLE -- There are plenty of high school football teams in West Virginia with more than six wins this season, but none of them have a better story than John Marshall.
The Monarchs moved to 6-3 on the season with a 42-0 win over Oak Glen (2-5) at home Friday evening, ensuring a winning record and cementing them even further into playoff positioning.
"It's very rare that you call a six-win season 'special'," said first-year JM coach Justin Kropka. "But you're talking about (a team) where we never had a kid that handled the ball in a varsity game coming into the season, with a new coach, a shortened time for the offseason and we get to send our seniors out winners."
Kropka's grin stretched from ear to ear as he celebrated with the team after the final whistle Friday night.
"I could not be more thrilled, no matter what happens in the postseason, our seniors get to go out winners and they deserve it," he said. "(The seniors) bought into a guy they didn't know and then we go out in week one and get beat 55-0. These guys deserve this tonight and I'm so happy I get to send these guys out and, no matter what happens, they're going to be known as winners."
The Monarchs were in need of a bounce-back performance after falling flat in a 33-7 loss to Morgantown last week. JM got off to a dreadful start against the Mohigans, turning the ball over on the opening kickoff and later throwing a first-half pick-six.
Against the Golden Bears, however, it was the Monarchs getting off to a fast start, forcing an OG fumble on the first possession of the game and scoring just one play later on a 12-yard run by freshman Klypson Wallace.
"With the start we had last week, I think it might've been the football gods throwing us a bone," Kropka said with a laugh.
John Marshall scored on all six of their possessions in the first half and held the Golden Bears to negative yardage to take a commanding 42-0 lead into the break. Wallace scored two more times on the ground for the Monarchs, senior Ben McCardle also ran in a score and quarterback Jacob Coffield threw touchdown passes to Jared Kerekes and Noah Beckett.
"Last week we were too high off the Brooke win and we didn't have a very good week of practice," Kropka said. "When we left film (last) Saturday I told them we'd never play like that again. I thought we lacked intensity early and there's no one to blame there but me. I cranked it up a little bit this week in practice and they responded, we had a great week of practice, one of our best weeks of practice."
The teams agreed to play eight-minute quarters in the second half. That, along with a running clock in the fourth quarter, meant the second half lasted less than an hour. JM's backups drove the ball into the redzone once, but turned it over on downs. Oak Glen ran for 72 yards and got inside the 10-yard line on their final drive of the game, but the accelerated clock ran out on them before the Golden Bears had a chance to break the shutout.
"They just play their guts out and I couldn't be prouder of a group of kids than I am of these guys," Kropka said. "This is so unique, the leading rusher on our team is a freshman (Wallace), the leading receiver is a freshman (Wesley Hughes). Every bit of football knowledge I've ever gained in my life says that doesn't lead to winning seasons and yet, here we are."
Wallace finished the game with 87 yards and three touchdowns on 12 carries. McCardle chipped in 17 yards and a score of his own on three carries. Coffield completed 6-of-7 passes for 61 yards and two scores. J.D. Wells (7-43) and Mickey Goddard (7-21) handled the bulk of the rushing in the second half.
On defense, Koda Moore had a first-quarter interception that set up a touchdown and Kerekes, Grant Neiswonger and Alex Thomas all registered sacks. Sophomore placekicker Connor Fitzpatrick knocked all six point-after attempts through the uprights and booted four touchbacks.
Oak Glen finished with 67 yards of total offense and 60 penalty yards. Tyler Mozingo led the team with 34 rushing yards followed by Nate Davis (15) and Aiden Flowers (13).
Kropka said last week's loss was a result of the team not responding well to a win over Brooke the week prior. He hopes his young team will come off this win over Oak Glen much better.
"The toughest part is handling success," he said. "You climb that mountain and get there and the young teams, inexperienced teams and teams that aren't used to it have trouble with that.
"I saw it coming (last week) and I still couldn't do anything about it. I've seen that before and it worried me to death last week and it played out just how I thought."
The Monarchs were celebrating Friday night, but they know the regular season is not over just yet as they will host rival Wheeling Park next week.
"You never know when that light is going to lick on," Kropka said. "It could be today, it could be tomorrow or it could be in week five next year.
"Let's hope it's sooner rather than later because this is our rival coming up. As a youngster I was a part of a heck of a lot of Martins Ferry-Bellaire games and so rivalries are important to me. It'll be nice to get it on with Park and boy, what a big game that's turned out to be."