By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
In an interesting strategical move, Class A St. Edmund (Eunice) came to Messmer Stadium Friday with the idea of shortening the game against Loyola as much as the clock would allow. The Blue Jays took as long as possible between plays and often stood at the line of scrimmage for 15 or 20 seconds before the snap.
The idea was to limit the number of possessions by the high-scoring Flyers.
“I thought it was a good plan by them to try to play keep away,” Loyola coach John Sella said. “I probably would have done the same thing.”
If the measuring stick for that strategy was time of possession, it might appear as though it worked for the Blue Jays as they had the ball an amazing 37 minutes compared to only 11 for Loyola.
But there was only one problem with that, as the Blue Jays found out over and over again – it doesn’t take Loyola long to score.
The Flyers came away with a 48-12 win and on their seven touchdowns drives, they never had one longer than three plays.
And it wasn’t as if those drives started on the doorstep of end zone. Five of the seven scores were on drives of 50 yards or longer.
“It’s not our intent to score quickly,” Sella said. “I mean, you’re always trying to score but I guess it would have been nice to put a (long) drive together.”
Not necessary.
Quarterback Bryce Restovich threw for six touchdowns – it would have been a record-tying seven if not for a fourth-down drop in the end zone in the first quarter – and threw for 333 yards. He needs three touchdown passes to reach 100 for his career.
Junior receiver Ty Walsworth caught six passes for 132 yards. Senior Graham Kyle also had two touchdown catches.
As it turned out, it was an easy win for Loyola but there were times in the first half in which it appeared it wouldn’t be the case. After the Flyers scored on the second play on a 45-yard pass from Restovich to Charlie McKenzie, Loyola was in ideal position to put the game away early with the next two possessions starting inside the St. Edmund 15.
Neither resulted in a single point. After that, St. Edmond ball possession/clock management strategy took over. The Blue Jays ran 27 of the next 29 plays and Loyola only managed a 14-6 halftime lead.
“I think we were a little nonchalant in how we were going about things at the beginning,” Sella said. “We were playing with low energy and we just weren’t focused.”
The Blue Jays had a chance to tie the score after receiving the second half kickoff and reached Flyer territory before losing the ball on downs.
After that, St. Edmund never had a chance as Loyola scored on all five possessions of the second half, ending with a 43-yard scoring run by Carson Ward, who started the game as a wide receiver before moving to backup quarterback in the fourth quarter.
Loyola is now 2-1 overall and will head to Jerry Burton Stadium to take on Northwood Friday night.
Contact JJ at johnjamesmarshall@yahoo.com