| JCA offense answers the call |
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East Suburban: Hilltoppers stave off pesky St. Viator
By Mike Fitzgerald Joliet Herald News
Joliet Catholic Academy made efficient use of its six offensive possessions, scoring five touchdowns to defeat St. Viator 34-16 Friday in East Suburban Catholic Conference play.
The Hilltoppers (2-0, 2-0) racked up 465 total yards of offense, but JCA surrendered 325 yards of offense to a pesky Lions team that was thinking upset into the fourth quarter of the game.
"St. Viator is a heck of a football team," JCA coach Dan Sharp said. "St. Viator played St. Pat's right down to the wire and they played us right down to the wire. This league is so good that we can't have mishaps like we had tonight and think that we're always going to pull them out."
St. Viator (0-2, 0-2) trailed 14-3 at halftime, but the Lions came out and put together a 10-play, 73-yard drive to start the third quarter. The drive ended with a 6-yard touchdown run by Dave Daniels to make it 14-10 with 7:04 left in the third quarter.
JCA responded on its next possession with nine straight running plays that covered 74 yards in 4:00 and ended in a touchdown when quarterback John Kiernan scored from 16 yards out on a bootleg.
Lions' quarterback Jared Funk led St. Viator down the field on its next possession. Funk hit receiver John Leahy with a 15-yard scoring strike to pull St. Viator within 21-16 with 1:26 to play in the quarter.
Funk, who would complete 18 of 30 passes for 193 yards, operated out of the shotgun and used an array of fake handoffs, option runs and pinpoint passing to keep JCA's defense on its heels.
The Hilltoppers' best defense turned out to be their offense. JCA made it 27-16 with 11:18 to play in the fourth quarter when running back Joe Benson capped a 70-yard drive with a punishing 12-yard touchdown run. Benson finished the game with two touchdowns, his first came at the end of the first half when he caught a 6-yard pass from Kiernan. Benson finished with 96 yards on 13 carries.
Viator marched down the field on its next possession but was stopped when Funk threw an incomplete pass on a fourth-and-8 at the JCA 42.
The Hilltoppers closed out the Lions with a five-play, 58-yard scoring drive which ended when running back Billy McKeon scored from 2 yards out.
McKeon finished the night with 144 yards rushing on 16 carries. He scored JCA's first touchdown on a 3-yard run in the first quarter. He also had a 98-yard kickoff return for a touchdown called back because of a holding penalty.
"It was anything but easy," Sharp said. "We never were comfortable today. We finally got a stop in the fourth quarter. I think the thing that was telling was how they controlled the ball. We only had six possessions. The first one we didn't score on, but after that we scored on every possession.
"I think we really need to see what we need to do defensively because if we don't fix what we have going here we might not make the playoffs with this league as good as it is.
"We had to make a lot of adjustments, but we really got good when we found our running game. We got into one formation and stayed with it. Another key, I thought, was our 2-minute drive at the end of the first half when we got that 14 points because they came out and scored in the second half. If we hadn't scored, it could have been a huge shift in momentum right there.
"John Kiernan's ability running the 2-minute offense and our ability to catch and pass block was huge to show that we could move the ball in the air under pressure."
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