By BRIAN SMITH
Sports Editor

Kenton’s late season run of six straight victories might be enough to help the Wildcats grab onto a share of the Western Buckeye League title — and at the least is giving the rest of the league a preview of what it will have to deal with for the next three seasons with another Mauk behind center.

The St. Marys football team couldn’t keep the ball on offense long enough to give its beleaguered defense a rest and keep the ball out of a freshman phenom’s hands on Friday night.

Kenton first-year quarterback Maty Mauk threw for 309 yards and three touchdowns and ran for 100 yards and two touchdowns as the Wildcats picked up a 35-7 win over the Roughriders at Skip Baughman Stadium on Friday night.

The loss is the second straight for St. Marys (7-2, 6-2 in the WBL) and the 28-point margin was the Riders’ worst loss since a 33-0 defeat to Ottawa-Glandorf in 2005.

It wasn’t the margin that bothered St. Mary head coach Doug Frye, though. It was the second straight loss with a WBL title on the line that was irksome to the 11th-year Rider mentor.

“It’s the wins you’re trying to rack up,” Frye said. “I was proud of our effort, but I think the last two weeks we’ve been in a bit of a funk. We need to pull out of that and we’re searching for ways to do that.”

St. Marys had just one first down in the first quarter and even when they did string some first downs together late in the first half, turnovers and fourth down stalls kept them out of the endzone.

“In the past when we’ve beaten Kenton, we’ve slammed running backs at them forty times and didn’t throw a single pass,” Frye said. “That’s what you have to do to beat Kenton. I think our defense played pretty well. We just couldn’t keep them off the field. And the kicker for us is that early on in the season we were playing well offensively. As funny as it sounds in a 35-7 game, I can’t put any blame on our defense.”

St. Marys found itself in a hole at the half. Mauk ran for two first-half touchdowns to send the Wildcats (6-3, 6-2) to the half with a 14-0 lead while St. Marys offense sputtered and struggled to get first downs.

St. Marys turned over the ball seven times with four lost fumbles and three interceptions,  giving Mauk and the powerful spread attack good field position to roll up about 400 yards in total offense and keep the Wildcats’ six-game surge ongoing.

Kenton stacked up the defensive front with six or seven players, looking to stop the Riders from long, time consuming drives.

“Our defense really stepped up and played well,” Mauk said. “We didn’t allow them to have those 12 and 13-yard runs and we forced some key turnovers and fourth down stops. We stopped them on their inside stuff for the most part and forced them outside.”

St. Marys’ problems were only compounded when late in the first half starting quarterback Jake Taylor came up woozy after a big hit by the Wildcats.

“It happened on a play near the half and he couldn’t speak correctly,” Frye said. “By the middle of the fourth quarter he got his wits about him again, but we weren’t going to put him back in the ballgame by that point.”

Taylor never re-entered the game, but Frye said that the senior quarterback would be okay. Tyler Gorby and Devon Fitzgerald came in to play quarterback in the second half.

“Losing their starter really put a lot of pressure on St. Marys and didn’t allow them to do the things they really wanted to do,” Mauk said.  

Kenton has won six straight games after starting the season 0-3 with losses to Coldwater, Shawnee and Ottawa-Glandorf with a group on offense that returned only one offensive starter at offensive tackle.

“I think any coach would happy with a team that steadily improves every week like we have,” Kenton head coach Mike Mauk said.

Kenton struck first with a touchdown with 2:10 left in the first quarter. It was Maty Mauk using his legs to finish off that drive, going in from 14 yards out to make it 6-0 after the extra point was blocked.

Kenton scored again in the second quarter on a Mauk 48-yard run up the middle. For a quarterback that was averaging less than three yards per carry on over 100 rushes this season, Mauk exploded for a triple digit number on the ground and a pair of scores. Frye said that the Riders offense inability to keep the defense off the field made that happen.

“They did a really good job defending us,” Mauk said. “They took away a lot of things that we wanted to do. We were still able to make some plays that allowed us to win the game.”

Mauk said that with St. Marys trying to take away the exterior passing game, the middle of the field open for Mauk to improvise and get yardage on the ground. “When you defend the pass the way they were and when you pass as much as we do, there’s room there for us to do some things running the football,” Mauk said. “Maty was banged up earlier this season and still is banged up to an extent, but we felt if we could get him past those linebackers there was some room up the middle to gain some yardage. We did that in the first half that got us our two scores. That opened some things up in the passing game later in the game.”

Kenton scored three times in the second half on Mauk touchdown passes. Mauk found Max Morrison on a 23-yard touchdown pass with 10:48 left in the third quarter to make it a three-score lead and effectively close the book on the Riders’ hopes without a passing game in play.

Mauk added two more touchdown passes in the fourth quarter, a 25-yard hookup with Andrew Tillman and a five-yarder with Bobby Handell to finish off the Kenton scoring at 35-0.

St. Marys added a touchdown late on a Kyle Puschel run from inside the five yard line to make it 35-7 and avoid the shutout.

Now things in the WBL get hairy. There could be as many as four teams laying claim to a piece of the WBL title after next Friday night’s games.

St. Marys can still assure itself a piece of a WBL title tie with a win next week at winless Elida. Because Ottawa-Glandorf plays at Shawnee, the winner of that game will also be assured a title tie. Defiance can get a shot at a part of the WBL with a home game against Celina, while Kenton hosts Van Wert where a win will get a piece of the title for the Wildcats.

Kenton  35
St. Marys   7

                        1    2     3       4       F
Kenton              6    8      7     14    35
St. Marys          0    0     0       7      7
 
SCORING SUMMARY
First Quarter
KEN — Maty Mauk 14-yard TD run (PAT blocked), K6-0, 2:03 (8-play, 54-yard drive).

Second Quarter
KEN — Maty Mauk 48-yard TD run (2-point converson good), K 14-0, 2:48 (7-play, 83-yard drive).

Third Quarter
KEN — Max Morrison 23-yard TD reception from Maty Mauk, K21-0, 4:43 (5-play, 31-yard drive).

Fourth Quarter
KEN — Andrew Tillman 25-yard TD reception from Maty Mauk (PAT good), K 28-0, 10:48(7-play, 60-yard drive).

KEN — Bobby Handell 5-yard TD reception from Maty Mauk (PAT good), K 35-0, 8:33 (6-play, 66-yard drive).
                      SM                  KEN
Rushing         54-281             10-100   

Yards per rush     5.2            10.0
Passing         3-11-26        8-14-130
Fumbles-Lost    6-4               1-1
Interceptions       3                 2
Turnovers            7                 3

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS 

Rushing — SM - Jeremy Frey 24-115, Kyle Puschel 2-52, Cory Dammeyer 9-38, Aaron Homan 9-39, Josh Zimmerman 3-27, Dylan Dietz 3-12, Cody Martin 1-4, Tyler Gorby 1---1, Jake Taylor 1--5. K - Maty Mauk 10-100.

Passing — SM - Jake Taylor 2-8-10, 3 INTS, Tyler Gorby 0-1-0, Devon Fitzgerald 1-2-16. K - Maty Mauk 25-43-307, 3 TDs, 2 INTs.

Receiving — SM - David Long 1-6, Dylan Dietz 1-16. K - Max Morrison 5-69, Chase Barnes 7-86, Bobby Handel 8-66, Andrew Tillman 3-44, Brice Fackler 2-48.