Bucs shoot down Rockets
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter Chartiers-Houston’s A.J. Myers breaks free for a good gain during Friday night’s game.
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter Jefferson-Morgan’s Colten Davidson breaks the tackle of Chartiers-Houston’s Jake Ognibene Friday.
JEFFERSON – The start of the 2016 high school football season was a pleasant one for the Chartiers-Houston Buccaneers.
The Bucs started fast on both sides of the ball, cruising to a 34-8 victory over Jefferson-Morgan Friday night in a non-conference game to open the season.
With both teams electing to start the season this week instead of having another week of practice, the Bucs looked like they were in midseason form.
“We played pretty well tonight,” Chartiers-Houston head coach Terry Fetsko said. “The first game you have some jitters and have people lining up in the wrong spots. That’s natural, but overall I was pleased with the effort. I felt we were ready to play with just the one week of practice and we came out and proved it tonight.”
C-H (1-0) started the game with a 45-yard touchdown pass from T.J. Johnston to A.J. Myers.
Jordan Davis then intercepted J-M (0-1) quarterback Elias Rafail on the Rockets first play from scrimmage and the Bucs turned the miscue into a quick touchdown with a Spencer Terling six-yard touchdown run.
Terling finished with 106 yards rushing on 16 carries and also caught a touchdown pass.
“We have some playmakers on both sides of the ball,” said Fetsko. “The defense forced turnovers and set us up with good field position and we capitalized on that.”
While the Bucs were on cue, Jefferson-Morgan was not.
J-M turned the ball over four times in the first half alone, which equaled the amount of first downs the Rockets mustered in the first 24 minutes.
Cody Scears and Myers had interceptions and Jake Ognibene recovered a fumble as C-H had an impressive effort on both sides of the ball.
The Bucs turned those turnovers into points as Terling caught a seven-yard touchdown pass to make it 21-0 and Johnston added a two-yard touchdown run to put C-H up by 28 points.
Johnston finished with 129 yards passing and three touchdown passes, completing 7 of 14 pass attempts, to go along with his rushing touchdown.
“T.J. played very well tonight,” Fetsko said. “He was very sharp and commanded the offense. That’s what you need.”
Chartiers-Houston’s Jacob Cavallo added an eight-yard touchdown catch to send the Bucs into halftime with a 34-0 lead.
Even when J-M seemingly caught a break, things didn’t quite go the Rockets’ way.
Myers muffed a punt that the Rockets recovered inside the red zone to give them their best field position of the game. But an illegal formation penalty forced J-M to punt. Myers returned it 68 yards to set up a Chartiers-Houston touchdown.
Myers also caught four passes for 106 yards and intercepted a pass.
“Anytime you turn the ball over like that, you aren’t going to win,” said Jefferson-Morgan head coach Aaron Georgi. “We had four turnovers on offense and the penalty on the punt. I count that as a turnover also. You have to protect the football and we did not do that tonight.”
J-M cleaned things a bit in the second half and finally got on the board when Joe Headlee scored on a 10-yard run late in the fourth quarter.
“I knew I would get asked if I regretted playing this week instead of having a scrimmage,” Georgi said. “I don’t regret it one bit. We have a lot of inexperienced guys out on the field. This whole atmosphere is a learning experience for them. We hate losing and it didn’t cost us a league game. We have to take a positive from this and get better moving forward.”
Fetsko feels the same, even after a solid first effort.
“It’s the first game,” Fetsko said. “We play some very good teams starting next week. Just like every other team this time of the year, we need to get better week to week.”