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Fast start is good tonic for Defiance

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By TIM McDONOUGH

mcdonough@crescent-news.com

The best way to kill any chance that an upset may occur from an underdog is to come out fast and not give them any hope. The Bulldogs of Defiance did just that on a Homecoming Friday night against a winless Elida team, racing out to a 35-0 lead at halftime in a 49-0 Western Buckeye League victory.

Defiance mentor Jerry Buti thought his team set the tempo right from the beginning of the game.

Said Buti: "Our seniors and all our starters went out and played the game the way it's supposed to be played. Elida has been in most of its game at halftime, but I thought our kids went out and did what they needed to do."

It turned out to be a milestone night for Defiance senior running back Travis Spitnale who crossed the 1,000-yard rushing plateau in the win. Spitnale rushed for 95 yards on 16 carries with one rushing and one receiving score. The senior now has 1,060 yards and 11 rushing TDs on the year.

"I'm really happy to reach that and I'm really happy for the offensive line ... they were just as happy and excited about it as I was," said Spitnale. "It's awesome to have guys like that around me, I couldn't do it without them so they deserve a lot of the credit."

The game also marked the first significant playing time for quarterback Sean Murray of Defiance, who had thrown just seven passes all season. Murray, who has been slowed by a hip injury, didn't look at all rusty. In fact, the lanky junior connected on his first eight passes and finished 10-of-11 for 165 yards and three touchdowns.

"I've been wanting to get back in there, I've been working hard in practice to get back up to full speed and tonight it was a lot of fun," said Murray. "The pass protection tonight was as good as its ever been, a lot of my success is because of my offensive line. Right now I'm 100 percent healthy so hopefully I can continue to play and try to help this team win games."

"The thing that I liked about Sean's play wasn't just the statistics, but how pin-point accurate he was tonight," said Buti. "He was really on, but he had lots of time, and we've got people who can catch the ball as well as anybody in this league."

Defiance (6-2, 5-2 WBL) raced out to a 21-0 lead at the end of the first quarter against Elida (0-8, 0-7 WBL), with Murray finding Travis Spitnale on an 18-yard screen pass for a score less than four minutes into the game.

When Alex Nofziger made the first of his two interceptions on Elida's next series, it only took six plays for Murray to find Nofizger on a 10-yard pass play for a quick 14-0 Defiance lead.

With just over two minutes to play in the opening stanza, Defiance drove a short field and capped off a five-play drive with a 15-yard burst to paydirt by Spitnale, who reached the 1,000-yard mark on the drive. Defiance led 21-0 and the rout was on.

"It was big that we were able to come out, get off to a fast start and establish ourselves on both sides of the ball right away," stated Defiance senior linebacker Alex Perez, who finished the night with a pair of sacks. "We came out and hit them in the mouth tonight from the beginning because we didn't want to give them any chance."

It was big to get off to a fast start agreed Defiance senior defensive back David Pagan, who also picked off a pass in the big win.

"Coming out fast like we did gave the whole team a lot of confidence," said Pagan. "Our offense came out and scored a lot early and our defense came up with the shutout. We haven't done that all year so it was nice to finish off a shutout for the first time."

Also scoring touchdowns in the first half for Defiance were quarterback Jordan Gonzales on a 6-yard scamper and Craig Gutman on a 40-yard pass from Murray. Derron Pritchett, who finished with 75 yards rushing, also scored for the home team, as did Gabe Struck.

"It was the perfect Homecoming night win," concluded Buti. "Our defense got a shutout, we got to play everybody, our offense did what it needed to do and our running back went over 1,000 yards. To me, that's a pretty good Friday night."

Defiance is back in action on Friday in its final away game of the season at Lima Bath.

ELIDA DEFIANCE

First Downs 7 20

Rushing Yards 21-24 50-253

Passing Yards 60 165

Total Yards 84 418

Passing 15-26-3 10-11-0

Fumbles 1 2

Fumbles Lost 0 0

Penalties 2-20 3-25

Elida 0 0 0 0 - 0

Defiance 21 14 0 14 - 49

Defiance - Spitnale 18-yard pass from Murray (Sebring kick).

Defiance - Nofziger 10-yard pass from Murray (Sebring kick).

Defiance - Spitnale 15-yard run (Sebring kick).

Defiance - Gonzales 6-yard run (Sebring kick).

Defiance - Gutman 40-yard pass from Murray (Sebring kick).

Defiance - Pritchett 5-yard run (Killion kick).

Defiance - Stuck 29-yard run (Killion kick).

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING: Elida - Ragin 6-30; Painter 5-8; Blymyer 1-1; R. McAdams 1-1; Al McAdams 5-(-16). Defiance - Spitnale 16-95; Pritchett 15-75; Stuck 4-46; Gonzales 8-25; Nofziger 2-23; Bates 3-(-5); Murray 1-(10).

PASSING: Elida - A. McAdams 13-21-3-59; R. McAdams 2-5-0-1. Defiance - Murray 10-11-0-165.

RECEIVING: Elida - Eilerman 5-35; A. McAdams 1-9; Ragin 1-8; Kraft 3-5; Warren 2-2; Cunningham 1-5; Blymyer 1-(-4). Defiance - Gutman 3-59; Nofziger 3-49; Mayeku 2-29; Spitnale 1-18; Sebring 1-10.