VALLEY VIEW — As the dust was still settling following Tri-Valley’s Week 10 loss to Williams Valley, Bulldogs Coach Jeff Sampson said his team was already chomping at the bit to get back on the field, in hopes of getting a second shot at the Vikings.
The Bulldogs are getting that shot.
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On Friday night, the Bulldogs began their postseason with a 37-7 blowout over the Marian Catholic Colts.
Rarely does a team find ways to score in all three facets of the game. Even rarer is a team doing so in a single quarter. Yet that’s exactly what the Tri-Valley Bulldogs did Friday evening against rival Marian Catholic — all in the opening 12 minutes.
After quarterback Trey Porter threw an interception on the Bulldogs’ opening drive, the Tri-Valley defense took matters into its own hands.
With the Colts facing 3rd-and-13 at their own 3-yard line, Marian quarterback Gregory Tirpak was strip-sacked in the end zone, allowing Robert Schwartz to pounce on the ball for a touchdown.
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After the Bulldogs’ defense forced a quick three-and-out on Marian’s ensuing possession, Tri-Valley’s offense wasted no time extending the lead. Needing just three plays, Porter connected with split end Carter Troutman for a 20-yard touchdown to push the score to 14-0.
It was a big night for both Porter and Troutman.
Porter finished the evening 6-for-10 for 175 yards and four touchdowns with two interceptions. In the win, the junior signal-caller surpassed 1,000 passing yards on the season and 2,000 for his career.
“We’ve always been a very heavy run team. But tonight, I guess they chose me to make some big plays,” Porter said of his performance. “I couldn’t do that without the O-line—they gave me so much time.”
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Troutman, entering the game with just one touchdown on the season, had three receptions for 52 yards and two scores. Like his quarterback, Troutman gave plenty of credit to the Bulldogs’ offensive front.
“It starts off with the O-line. The O-line’s got to block and do their job—they were doing it all night,” Troutman said. “And then I’ve got to get open, so a lot of things have to go right, and it all went well tonight.”
The first-quarter nightmare for Marian continued on its third drive. Following another stalled possession that forced the Colts to punt from their own goal line, Tri-Valley linebacker and tailback Landon Horoschak split the gap and blocked Tyler Price’s punt out the back of the end zone for a safety, sending the Bulldogs into the second quarter ahead 16-0.
The Bulldogs made it a 23-0 lead with under four and a half minutes remaining in the second quarter when Porter found a wide-open Troutman in the end zone for a second time, with the score holding into the break.
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Marian’s fortunes did not improve after the break, as Dante Tate fumbled the opening kickoff to give the Bulldogs possession at the Colts’ 30-yard line. Five plays later, Horoschak punched it in from 2 yards out to stretch the lead to four scores.
“We’ve had issues in the past, this past year, with not being able to finish out games and putting the gas down,” Tri-Valley head coach Jeff Sampson said. “So I thought we did that very well tonight. That’s something moving forward here over the next couple weeks that we have to continue to do.”
The Bulldogs tacked on another score in the third quarter when Porter dropped a perfect pass into the breadbasket of Doyle Flory for a 50-yard touchdown, putting the game on ice.
“It’s huge,” Sampson said of his team’s elevated passing attack on Friday, a continuing trend for the Bulldogs. “I think Trey, the last three weeks, has thrown for over 150 yards. I think he’s settling in as our signal-caller, so it’s important for us. We like to run the ball, but we understand as well that you just can’t run the ball; you’ve got to have more balanced chances in the game. I think we’ve been doing very well the last couple of weeks.”
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Marian broke the shutout in the fourth quarter when Tirpak found an open Price coming out of the backfield for a 23-yard touchdown, bringing the game to its final score of 37-7.
It proved to be the lone blemish of the night for the Tri-Valley defense, which smothered the Colts for just 31 total yards and held Marian to minus-12 rushing yards on 22 carries thanks in large part to multiple sacks and tackles for loss.
“Our defense has kept us in games more than just tonight,” Sampson said about his team’s defensive effort. “Our defense has played extremely well all year. I think they were in the top two or three in the county, so there’s no surprise there that they’ve done as well as they had tonight. It’s a testament to the players on defense and also our defensive coaches, who do a tremendous job getting these kids ready for Friday night.”
With the win, Tri-Valley gets the opportunity for redemption next Saturday as it takes on rival Williams Valley for the second time in three weeks. The Vikings defeated Lackawanna Trail 49-24 on Friday night to punch their own ticket to the District 11 Class A championship game.
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“We’ve got to play amazing defense next week, even better than we did this week,” Porter said. “We have to stop their run. We just have to play amazing defense—that’s where it starts. And we’ve just got to get it moving on offense.”
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: Sports.yahoo.com
