Powerful running game leads to 35-6 victory
OCEAN CITY – The Red Raiders football team fell 35-6 at home Friday night to Delsea as Ocean City had no answers for the Crusaders’ relentless rushing attack.
Four different Crusaders scored at least one rushing touchdown, and running back Luke Maxwell scored two as Delsea responded to an early Raiders score with five unanswered TDs.
“It’s the worst way to lose a football game, because you feel helpless,” Ocean City head coach Kevin Smith said. “Then you start to compensate for it and they find the area where you weakened in order to compensate and they attack there. That’s a great coaching staff. They’ve been there forever, they know exactly what they’re doing. They’re a senior-heavy team and those guys run that system really well, so they were impressive.”
After a kickoff out of bounds gifted them great field position, the Raiders wasted no time taking advantage.
Following a first down across midfield, quarterback Riley Gunnels shifted left to buy time and hit Jon Moyer on an intermediate route.
“It’s really fun,” Moyer said. “The way you run routes in practice and in games, he can just hit you on a dime. It’s a lot easier for the receivers having a good quarterback like that.”
Moyer grabbed the pass and went 55 yards up the sideline untouched for a Raider lead less than two minutes in.
“Gunnels was great scrambling out of the pocket,” Moyer said. “He found me cutting across the middle of the field, and as soon as I caught it there was no one in front of me, so I just took it.”
The extra point went wide left.
The Raiders were a play away from making a stop when quarterback Zach Maxwell slipped free for a 25-yard run into Raider territory.
The Crusaders continued to pound the ball into the red zone, eating up more than six minutes on the possession, and Wayne Adair finished the drive on a three-yard toss play for a 7-6 Delsea lead.
The Raiders were quickly looking at 3rd-and-long when Gunnels connected with Jack Hoag on a deep ball.
Hoag made the grab as he tumbled out of bounds for a 28-yard gain.
A swing pass to Hoag netted another first down as he shed a tackler and burst upfield.
Yet another pass to Hoag, a screen, gained 16 yards into the red zone.
A penalty followed by a dropped pass and a third-down sack foiled the Raider drive.
They turned it over on downs and it would be the closest the Raiders would get the rest of the game.
“We came out of the gate strong, then after that second drive on offense we kind of struggled,” Moyer said. “We just had to keep our heads up and keep going.”
“On the second drive we went right down the field too,” Smith said. “Then we had a dropped pass on a play that would have given us a first-and-goal, we had a false start. You can’t make mistakes against a team like that; you almost have to play a perfect game. That’s the pressure they put on you.”
Delsea moved the ball at will without attempting a pass all game.
The key play on their next series was a 35-yarder from Luke Maxwell.
Jared Schoppe made it a 14-6 lead just past the midway point of the second quarter.
After a quick stop Delsea took a commanding lead when Luke Maxwell outran everyone on a 40-yard score.
“We have to improve in the physical game,” Moyer said. “We were in the right spots but we were just getting driven back, but we just have to come in with a lot of energy and get ready to play.”
Leading 21-7 at halftime, Delsea nearly added to their lead immediately out of the break.
Luke Maxwell took the kickoff for a touchdown that was nullified by a block in the back.
Instead Delsea took possession at midfield and Zach Maxwell scaped the pocket on third down for a 37-yard score three minutes into the third quarter for a 28-6 lead.
“Last year we went 11-0 until Millville,” Moyer said, “then that kind of punched us in the gut. But we need games like this during the season so we can evaluate ourselves and see where we are against physical teams like this. We can just bounce back and get ready for next week.”
The Crusader pass rush continued to generate quick defensive stops and Luke Maxwell tacked on one more score from more than 40 yards out late in the third.
“Their running back ran hard,” Moyer said. “We just have to be in the right spots, get ready to hit. I think we just needed to come out with more energy today.”
Gunnels has taken a lot of hits early in the season.
“He’s a big kid,” Smith said. “You never want your QB to get hit, but he’s got to able to sort of handle that stuff. So I’m not concerned.”
With a bye this week, the Raiders will look to move back over .500 when they visit Winslow at 7 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 1.
“Everybody is doubting us,” Moyer said. “We’ve got new people stepping up and everybody says we lost that whole senior class, but we have to step up because we have a tough schedule ahead of us.”
“Our next game is against Winslow Township, another defending sectional champ. Then after that is St. Joe. So it’s not (getting easier), it’s going to be a heavyweight every week and we’ve got to be able to raise ourselves to that level. We have a lot of young kids on the field; at one point we were playing nine underclassmen on defense and they’re going to learn the hard way. But it’s going to be good for them in the long run.”
“The goal is to get a good run in the playoffs, get the young guys stepping up because I still have next year, and try to send the seniors off with the best run possible,” Moyer said.
The underclassmen have no choice but to get up to speed in a hurry.
“They definitely work hard every day,” Moyer said, “but we have some improving to do. We’ll get there.”
Coach Smith said he needed to look at the game tape to know if his team battled to the end.
“I don’t know, we have to check the film,” Smith said. “I hope so. That team is great up front, they execute tremendously well, they put a ton of pressure on you because they don’t make mistakes, they hide the football really well. I don’t know if it was a matter of their execution or them just being able to do what they do better than we do what we do; I hope so. I hope it wasn’t an effort issue, but we’ll have to look at the film and figure that out.”
“I don’t think anybody hung their head or anything. It’s demoralizing when you’re getting physically handled but we kept playing hard.”
By KYLE McCRANE/Sentinel staff
