MOUNT UNION - After a tough 42-14 loss to Juniata Valley a week ago, the Mount Union football team came into Friday night's game against Inter-County Conference foe Southern Huntingdon with one thing in mind - find a win. And that's exactly what the Trojans did in their 35-0 thumping of the Rockets.
The Trojans' first drive, in which they also scored their first touchdown, foreshadowed the dominance they would display the whole game.
That scoring drive started when Mount Union's Riley Grainey returned Southern Huntingdon's kickoff to his team's own 43-yard line. The Trojans tried only two running plays for a gain of a yard before Klayton Heffner took a pass from Trevon Walker for a 56-yard touchdown. The extra point was missed, but that was made up for when after a B.J. Loner touchdown later in the quarter, Kahlil Fortson took a pass in the end zone from from running back Dylan Smith to get the two point conversion, making the score 14-0.
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Sentinel photo by BUFFIE BOYER
Mount Union’s Jamal Smith, center, catches the ball in the end zone for a touchdown in the second quarter in Mount Union Friday. Southern Huntingdon’s (32), left, and (11) defend on the play. See more photos online at cu.lewistownsentinel.com
Going into the second quarter, it momentarily appeared as though the Trojans had slowed, as they had the ball at Southern Huntingdon's 3-yard line but were unable to score, but they weren't to be counted out yet. As the clock ticked down near the end of the half, Mount Union was poised to score when it was first-and-10 on the Rockets' 19-yard line.
Things started to get dicey when Mount Union quarterback, Trevon Walker threw two incomplete passes into the end zone, but Walker stuck with it and on the third down found Jamal Smith for a touchdown just as the clock ran out of time.
This touchdown pass was just a small sample of what Walker brought to the game for Mount Union. With 172 yards passing and 34 rushing, Walker made up just over half of Mount Union's total yardage for the night. But on that last touchdown of the half, he was humble and gave Smith credit for the play.
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"Jamal - he made a great catch at the end," Walker said. "I tried to get it to him, throw a good pass, and basically all the credit goes to him."
In the second half of the game Mount Union scored 14 more points to bring the final score to 35-0.
Mount Union coach Corey Wertz was pleased with the improvement he saw in his team's offense from last week's loss to Juniata Valley.
"Monday we challenged these guys, you know, I don't want to say that they didn't try last week, but they kind of packed it in early against Juniata Valley. So we challenged them on Monday to have a great week of practice both offensively and defensively, and I thought they really responded well tonight," Wertz said.
And the team did respond well. In fact, the boys responded as a team so well that each of Mount Union's five touchdowns was scored by a different player.
Mount Union travels to Moshannon Valley next Friday, and in that next matchup Wertz looks to see improvement from his defensive line.
"We still have a little bit of kinks," said Wertz, who had been disappointed with his defensive line against Juniata Valley, but thought the line did better against Southern Huntingdon.
"They did a lot better today - we forced some turnovers, which is good," he said. "We're still doing a little bit of over penetrating with our tackles, and if we can correct that I think we're going to be okay."
