by PARMA, OHIO– The St. Ignatius Wildcats steamrolled the GlenOak Eagles tonight in front of a packed house at Byers Field. The sellout crowd saw the Wildcats improve to 7-0 on the year with a dominating 34-20 victory over GlenOak. The loss drops the Eagles to 2-5 in a disappointing season.
GlenOak held a surprising 7-3 lead after one quarter, but head coach Chuck Kyle and the Wildcats were not worried. Less than two minutes into the second quarter, the Wildcats offense got cooking when Dan Alexander hooked up with Sam Synder for a 37-yard touchdown pass to put St. Ignatius ahead, 10-7.
The Eagles battled back to tie the game at 10 a few moments later, but then it was all St. Ignatius from there as they would go on to score the next 24 points unanswered. The scoring explosion started when Alexander hooked up with Snyder again, this time for 66 yards with only 20 seconds left in the first half. The clutch score put the Wildcats up 17-10 at the half. It was an impressive first half for St. Ignatius that saw them run 25 offensive plays totaling 200 yards.
The second half was much more of the same as Dan Alexander connected yet again with Sam Synder for the third time on the night to score. This launch came from 31 yards out and gave St. Ignatius their biggest lead of the game at 24-10 minutes into the second half. Later in the third quarter a Alexander touchdown rumble from 2 yards out would put the game out of reach at 31-10.
Before the game could go final at 34-10, it would see a bit of history. With 2:06 left in the third quarter, St. Ignatius place kicker Matthew Trickett booted a 59-yard field goal to go down in the record books as the longest kick ever in school history. It was also the fourth longest in OHSAA history as well.
The Wildcats have had a grueling schedule thus far this season, with what is widely considered as one of the toughest slates in the state. Tonight was the start of a challenging four-game stretch to close out the regular season.
