There was no mincing words and there was no shining it up for Buckeye Valley football coach Matt Stephens.
It was quick and it was decisive. Clear Fork reeled off 34 first-half points and cruised to a 44-0 win over BV to spoil the Barons’ physical home-opener.
“We were bad on both sides of the ball this week,” Stephens said. “We’ve had games where the offense was playing well, but the defense wasn’t or the defense was playing well, but the offense wasn’t.
“I talked to them about having both sides working on all cylinders and tonight – neither one of them were there.”
Jared Schaefer ran for a pair of touchdowns and threw for two more to lead the visiting Colts to an MOAC win Friday night in Delaware.
“We were concerned about (BV’s) defense,” Clear Fork coach Dave Carroll said. “They haven’t been giving up a whole lot of points. They’ve been playing different fronts, different formations with a lot of blitzing and a lot of pressure. We hadn’t seen anything like that so far this year.”
Even when the Colts’ backs were against the proverbial wall, they still found a way to do damage. Case in point – Schaefer scrambled for a 20-yard touchdown run on their first drive.
He added a 6-yard run two drives later to push it to 12-0, then found A.J. Blubaugh on a 13-yard touchdown in the second quarter.
“We barraged our offensive linemen (with information),” Carroll said. “I think some of them were starting to develop ulcers and stress this past week because we just blitzed through everything we could to try to prepare them for this.”
When Schaefer wasn’t doing damage, Brennan South was. South made up for a first-quarter interception by finding Caden Flynn for an 82-yard touchdown down the left sideline to give the Colts (5-0, 2-0) a 20-0 lead with 9:52 left in the second quarter.
“We knew we were going to have to do a lot of damage through the air,” Carroll said. “(We knew) they were going to try to take away the run and they did a real good job of that.”
“That’s what they do,” Stephens said. “They make you defend the whole field with (Trevon Trammell) and (Zach Homerick). Once we start spreading things out in a five-man box – they gash us with their quarterback off the jet (sweep).”
Trammell capped the first-half scoring with a scoop-and-score 18-yard return of a blocked punt to give the Colts a 34-0 lead.
Clear Fork came up roses on its third-quarter touchdown, too. Schaefer found Blubaugh on a post route for a 79-yard touchdown pass. The Colts were facing second-and-41 after a false start penalty and a snap over Schaffer’s head.
Gabe Blauser added a short field goal in the fourth quarter to cap the scoring.
“(Clear Fork) is a good football team – we knew that coming in,” Stephens said.
Andy Anthony had an interception in the second quarter for the Barons (1-4, 1-1).
Next up, BV continues league play with a visit to Ontario next week. Kickoff is set for 7 p.m.
“(We’ll) watch the film and teach off the tape and have a better week of practice,” Stephens said. “We’re not starting over from scratch. I like the kids that I have. We’ll pick it up and hopefully rectify this thing at Ontario.”
