That certain feeling…of knowing you’re going to score. Marion’s Parker Hess smiles as he nears the goal on his 55-yard first half touchdown run in Friday’s win over Anna. (Press Pros Feature Photos)
As efficient as you can ask for in a high school football team, Marion Local streaked to its 56th consecutive win Friday, victimizing Anna in just 24 minutes.
Anna, OH – As the wins pile up, the stats and the hyperbole, the specter of the Marion Local Flyers and what they doing in Division VII football ascends proportionately.
Winners now of 56 games in a row following Friday’s 42-0 whitewashing of Anna (5-3), like the lyrics to the old Mac Davis song read…it’s hard to be humble about something like that.
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Tim Goodwin would cringe at such a metaphor, but the reality is that the Flyers are 8-0, have outscored their opponents 407 to 22, have not been scored upon in three weeks, and defy the notion that they’re anything less than what they are.
Not the biggest, or the fastest, or a conduit for Division I college recruits, they are, nonetheless, the pinnacle…the most consistent team in Ohio high school football. Reigning champs for three consecutive seasons, and 56 in a row, it is what it is.
Still, Goodwin did his best to come across as something less than the obvious Friday, searching for some kind of chink in the armor when he talked about their latest avalanche win.
“You know we went three and out on our first possession,” he began. “Their defense played pretty well that first drive.
“But yeah,” he quickly turned. “We just have athletes at a lot of spots and we’re playing pretty decent football right now. So yeah…that’s the way it’s been going.”
One step away…An Anna defender grabbing his shoe is all that kept Marion’s Griffin Bruns from returning this punt for a touchdown.
In his words, that’s all it is. But the reality is they’re good enough to dictate the way things have been going. It’s true that Anna held them to three-and-out on the first drive…but they scored on six ensuing possessions against a 5-2 football team and averaged just five plays per possession doing it.
After the three and out, they forced Anna to punt and 6 plays later scored on a 5 yard pass from Justin Knouff to Oliver Huelsman to go up 7-0…just 3 minutes and 24 seconds after the three and out.
Another Anna possession, and a turnover when quarterback Alex Shappie fumbled at the 40 yard line. And in five plays this time Drew Lause ran it in from two yards out to make the score 14-0…at 3:17 of the first quarter.
Another Anna punt and Victor Hoelscher scored on a 55 yard run on the first play from scrimmage at 2:57…21-0, Marion.
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The big plays continued. On the first possession of the second quarter Anna punted again, Marion’s Griffin Bruns caught the ball on his own 30, and began weaving his way upfield for 55 yards before he was tripped up by the last Anna tackler between him and the goal line. Two plays later Knouff ran it in from 14 yards at 11:00 to extend the lead to 28-0.
Like a broken record, at 7:09 Knouff connected with Andrew Pohlman from 12 yards for a score that took just four plays…35-0, Marion.
Justin Knouff steps into the end zone with this 7-yard run for the Flyers’ fourth score.
And after yet another Anna punt with 3:54 left in the half, it was Parker Hess, breaking a tackle at the line of scrimmage and then raced up the sideline (above) for 55 yards and the concluding score of the game.
Count ’em up, 30 plays (give or take) on six possessions and 42 points in a span of 20 minutes and 6 seconds.
While the bands played at halftime the stands began to empty – people on Walnut Street heading someplace to watch playoff baseball. To Goodwin’s earlier point, things have been going that way.
And to his point about having athletes at critical spots on the field, they have a greater selection than any of the previous fourteen title teams. A program that historically loves to run the ball and punish opposing defenses, this year’s Marion team has a passing game with Knouff, Vic Hoelscher, Andrew Pohlman and Griffin Bruns that’s nigh on impossible to defend.
Case in point, Hoelscher’s catch to extend a drive in the second quarter on a ball over his head and with an Anna defender Carson Pleiman draped on, pulling him backwards. Hoelscher caught it anyway.
But beyond that, they have what Al Hetrick used to call the most important thing of all…the intimidation factor. “You want teams to believe they’re beaten when they walk on the field,” said Hetrick, whose Versailles Tigers knew something about win streaks and consecutive titles. “And once you lose it,” he cautioned, “it’s awful hard to get it back.” Goodwin and the Flyers show no threat of losing it.
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Anna coach Nick Marino was gracious to talk about his team and the specter of playing this Marion Local football team during the current run.
“This was not what we were looking for tonight,” he said with a smile, referring to the outcome. “They’re obviously really good, they came out and played really well tonight…and we didn’t. We should have played better than we did, but those guys are great, they’re on a long win streak, and the consistency they have is pretty unbelievable.
“You hope that it doesn’t factor in, but people are telling you all week about how bad you’re going to get beat and you’ve got to tune that stuff out and just play football,” he added. “You don’t want to play the role people expect you to play, you want to play the role you need to play, and we didn’t play our best football tonight.”
With some degree of difficulty…Marion’s Vic Hoelscher makes an acrobatic catch despite the efforts of Anna’s Carson Pleiman.
For Goodwin and the Flyers, people are beginning to run out of descriptive adjectives…or even things that concern them between now and whatever the season is yet to bring.
“Well, we’re playing the two best teams, besides us, in the league the next two weeks (Minster and Coldwater),” Goodwin cautions. “The competition is going to be much tougher – the quality of those teams. Minster and Coldwater are very similar and that would be the biggest concern. They’re the two best teams in the league and we haven’t played them yet.”
Like Marino, Friday was not what Goodwin had expected.
“I thought athletically it would be a different game than what we’ve had for most of the year. Like, all of our games have gone like this, with big leads in the first half. I thought our offense against their defense was a good matchup, and I thought they would struggle stopping us. But their offense against our defense…I thought they would score and drive the ball. And they did drive the ball, but they never seriously threatened.”
Anna gained precious few yards, and quarterback Alex Shappie (above) paid for it.
In terms of total offense, Marion finished with 290 yards while playing with a running clock in the second half, and most of their bench in the game – 390 yards in all. They ran the ball for 146 yards, while Justin Knouff threw it for another 144 (eight of ten).
Anna totaled just 142 yards, with running back Zach Osborn and quarterback Alex Shappie getting the brunt of the load.
Winners Friday night over Versailles, 35-0, Minster will enter next week’s game at Marion with a 7-1 record, and statistically present the biggest challenge Marion has yet to see.
And, they stand on the threshold of the record – Delphos St. John’s 57-game streak set twenty three years ago. Minster coach Seth Whiting’s dad, Vic, was an integral part of that while serving as the coach at Delphos from 1988 to ’98. Sports is funny that way.
Cliche’ as it is, what goes around in this case, has come around.
History, and Marion Local…loom.
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