Minster Defeats Delphos
St. John’s 10-7 on 30 Yard Field Goal as Time Expires
by
Bruce Monnin
MINSTER — In a
game of missed opportunities, the Delphos St. John’s Blue Jays failed to take a
late lead, then the Minster Wildcats capitalized on their final chance. With the score tied 7-7 late in the fourth quarter,
St. John’s drove 47 yards on six plays to the Minster 15-yard line. On fourth down and three, a Blue Jay pass was
broken up by Bryce Barhorst to give the Wildcats the
ball with 2:08 remaining.
Minster used ten plays to drive to the St.
John’s 13-yard line with five seconds remaining. Bryan Falk calmly drilled game winning 30-yard
field goal through the middle of the uprights as time expired.
The Wildcats started fast, stopping the Blue
Jays without a first down on their opening drive. Minster then moved the ball 62 yards on ten
plays for the opening score. An 11-yard
pass from Johnny Nixon to Phil Trzaska gave the
Wildcats a 7-0 lead which would last until early in the fourth quarter.
The second quarter saw a rash of missed scoring
chances. St. John’s drove inside the
Minster 25-yard line but came up inches short on a fourth down run. The Wildcats responded by driving to the Blue
Jay 23-yard line before a holding penalty stalled the drive and resulted in a
punt.
After the teams exchanged fumbles on back-to-back
plays, St. John’s tried to tie the game before
halftime. After reaching the Minster one-yard
line, quarterback Brady Kerner was stuffed for a one-yard loss on fourth down
just before the half expired.
The Wildcats had two chances to put the game
away in the third quarter. On their
opening drive they reached the Blue Jay one yard line, before turning over the
ball on a broken play where most of the team moved before the ball was
snapped. The loose pigskin was recovered
by St. John’s. On another drive, Minster
reached the Blue Jay 32-yard line before being stopped on fourth down.
St. John’s tied the game early in the fourth
quarter when Clay Paddubny gashed the Wildcats
defense for a 54-yard touchdown run.
With under four minutes remaining in the game,
the Blue Jays moved 40 yards in two plays to the Minster 22-yard line. The Wildcat defense allowed only seven yards
in the next three rushing plays, setting up Barhorst’s
breakup of a fourth down pass attempt.
With only 2:08 remaining in the game, Minster
had perhaps their most impressive drive of the game. Nixon completed four out of five passes for
30 yards, while Austin Wellman rushed four times for another 37 yards to set up
Falk’s game winning kick.
Wellman was the leading Wildcat rusher with 113
yards on 19 carries, while Conner Albers contributed 71 more yards on 16
carries. Nixon completed 15 of 21 pass
attempts for 114 yards and a touchdown, with Trzaska
catching seven of those throws for 42 yards and the first quarter score.
With the win, Minster improves to 1-3 for the
season. The Wildcats will host 4-0
Marion Local next Friday. Delphos St.
John’s falls to 1-3. They also have a
challenge next week, hosting 4-0 Coldwater.
Score
by quarter 1 2 3 4 Total
Minster 7 0 0 3 10
Delphos
St. John’s 0 0 0 7 7
First
Quarter:
MIN
– Phil Trzaska 11 yd pass from Johnny Nixon (Bryan
Falk kick), 4:42
Fourth
Quarter:
DSJ
– Clay Paddubny 54 yd run (Chase Martin kick), 9:44
MIN
– Bryan Falk 30 yd field goal, 0:00
Team
statistics MIN DSJ
First
downs 18 12
Rushes
– yards 42-190 29-128
Passing
yards 113 116
Comp
- att – int 15-21-0 10-18-0
Total
yards 303 244
Punts
– average 3-34.0 4-28.2
Fumbles
– lost 2-2 1-1
Penalties
– yards 5-35 1-5
Time
of possession 29:02 18:58
Individual
statistics
Rushing: Minster, Wellman 19-113, Albers 16-71, Nixon
6-9, Team 1-(minus 3); Delphos St. John’s, Paddubny
17-118, Schulte 2-16, Schrader 1-6, Fairchild 1-0, Elwer
1-(minus 6), Kerner 7-(minus 6)
Passing: Minster, Nixon 15-21-0-113; Delphos St. John’s,
Kerner 10-18-0-116
Receiving: Minster, Trzaska
7-41, Wellman 4-28, Ketner 3-34, Wuebker 1-10;
Delphos St. John’s, Fittro 2-25, Elwer
2-22, Schulte 1-20, Martz 1-19, Grothaus 1-17, Kahny 1-8, Fairchild 1-5, Paddubny
1-0