Local Sports

Tigers routed by Mustangs, 42-0

Second-year Marietta head football coach Mike Kupfner was hoping that Friday night's home game against the unbeaten Claymont Mustangs would be the game his Tigers turned things around and picked up their first win of the season.

Unfortunately for Kupfner and his squad, the Tigers played perhaps their worst game of the season as they fell to 0-5 following the Mustangs 42-0 win.

The Tiger defense struggled against a balanced Claymont offensive attack while the Marietta offense was basically non-existent.

Marietta spent almost the entirety of the game on its own side of the field while securing just four first downs and 135 total yards, all of them coming on the ground.

A pair of long runs by Daymeon Gulley (27 yards) and Nick McGill (51 yards) made up for more than half of that total.

"I really thought that this was going to be the week that we put it all together and not kill ourselves and put four strong quarters together and we just didn't do that," said Kupfner. "I've got to self-reflect a little bit on my approach to practice and some things we are doing because obviously something is not clicking for us."

Claymont showed early on the kind of talent they had offensively as they drove 87 yards on just nine plays with running back Kam Stout scoring on an 11-yard run on their opening possession of the game.

After a Tiger punt was blocked on their next possession and recovered deep in their own territory they got a big play at the time by freshman Kyree Singer, who intercepted a Brady Henry pass at the goal-line to temporarily keep the Mustangs from adding to their lead.

The Tigers were able to move the ball out near midfield but turned the ball over on downs to the Mustangs.

The next stretch of the first half would prove to be fatal for the Tigers as they would allow Claymont to score three touchdowns in the final five minutes of the first half.

A 40-yard pass from Henry to Lucas Toland made it a 14-0 game and after the Mustangs defense forced the Tigers into a three-and-out they perfectly executed a two-minute drill and scored on Stout's second touchdown of the opening half with less than a minute to play.

The Tigers made a huge mistake on their next possession as they fumbled the ball with Claymont recovering at the Tiger 40-yard line with just 22 ticks on the first half clock.

The Mustangs moved the ball down to the 23-yard line where Henry fired a jump ball up into the corner of the end zone where Toland out-jumped the Tiger defender to make the catch for the touchdown and a 28-0 lead as time expired in the opening half.

Claymont got the ball to begin the second half and picked up right where they left off as they drove 60 yards on nine plays with Calvin Edwards bulldozing his way into the end zone for a 2-yard touchdown run to set the running clock into motion.

Stout would pick up his third touchdown of the game later in the quarter on a 28-yard run to cap the scoring.

Henry completed 10-of-16 pass attempts in the game for 158 yards and the two touchdown passes to Toland, while Stout finished the game with 87 yards on 11 carries.

Mustang kicker Cooper Newton was a perfect six-for-six in point-after kicks.

McGill led the orange and black in rushing yards with 49 yards on two carries while Braydon Frye picked up 40 tough yards on 18 carries.

Kupfner felt like he got some solid play from his secondary, one that found itself undersized against the much taller Mustang receivers.

"It was really nice to get Braylon Williams back from an injury and he played really well and did some nice things," said Kupfner. "Freshman Kyree Singer made some plays too and came up with that interception."

The Tigers will quickly need to forget about the loss and turn their attention to Amanda Clearcreek who pays a visit to Don Drumm next Friday night.

"Claymont came ready to play and their coach does a great job with them," said Kupfner. "I know we are young but we have got to stop using that excuse. We've got to go back to the drawing board and see if we can't get back on the winning side in the second half."

Claymont 42, Marietta 0

CHS (5-0) 7 21 14 0 - 42

MHS (0-5) 0 0 0 0 - 0

C: Kam Stout 11 run (Cooper Newton kick) 4:37, 1st

C: Lucas Toland 40 pass from Brady Henry (Newton kick) 4:34, 2nd

C: Stout 13 run (Newton kick) :54, 2nd

C: Toland 23 pass from Henry 0:00, 2nd

C: Calvin Edwards 2 run (Newton kick) 6:58, 3rd

C: Stout 25 run (Newton kick) 0:00. 3rd

Team Stats

Claymont: First downs: 15, Rushes-yards: 25-169, Passing yards: 158, Total yards: 327, Passing: 10-17-1, Fumbles-lost 0-0, Penalties-yards: 6-45, Punts-avg: 1-40.0

Marietta: First downs: 4, Rushes-yards: 35-135, Passing yards: 0, Passing: 0-0-0, Total yards: 135, Fumbles-lost 1-1, Penalties-yards: 6-40, Punts-avg: 3-31.3.

Individual Stats

Claymont: Rushing: Kam Stout 11-87, Calvin Edwards: 3-41, Drevon Searcy: 6-17, Passing: Brady Henry: 10-16-0, 158yds, 2TD, Receiving: Lucas Toland 3-64, Kullin Akers 1-37, Jackson Jinks 4-24, Daniel McGarr 1-22.

Marietta: Rushing: Nick McGill 2-49, Braydon Frye 18-40, Daymeon Gulley 2-27, Trenton McVey 11-15, Cooper Brown 2-4. Passing: McVey 0-1-0, Frye 0-1-0, Dylan Combs 0-1-0.

Next Game: Amanda-Clearcreek at Marietta.