by It was a perfect night for Friday night lights in Parma at Byers Field where St. Ignatius hosted Archbishop Moeller. However, it was a lopsided affair, seeing Moeller win the contest 44-0.
The first quarter saw the St. Ignatius Wildcats receiving the ball first. Grant Washington started things off strong with a 26-yard wildcat rush. After a first successful wildcat play by the Wildcats, they went back to it for a nice gain of 9-yards. A strong first drive for the St. Ignatius Wildcats ended abruptly with a fumble seeing Moeller recover the ball.
Archbishop Moeller came out firing highlighting their offensive prowess. Dante Wear came out with a nice gain of 13-yards to start their first offensive drive of the game. Moeller was moving the ball right away which led to a 26-yard passing touchdown from Matt Ponatoski to Carson Khayo. Moeller took the lead early making it 7-0 just a minute and 26 seconds into the contest.
Grant Washington came back out to get his offense going, starting with a nice gain of 16 yards to start their second drive of the game. However, St. Ignatius had a slow and conservative drive that led to a quick 3 and out, and the Wildcats were forced to punt the ball away.
Moeller came back out hoping to score yet again on their second drive of the game. Moeller looked to take a deep shot down the field on 3rd down to Carso Khayo but came up short. A silent second offensive drive by Moeller forced them to punt the ball away.
Both offenses were in a dry spell after an entertaining first 2 minutes. The Wildcats came back out but didn’t do anything with their drive and were forced to punt the ball away. The Wildcats’ punt was blocked and rolled out of the endzone resulting in a safety. The safety made the score 9-0 Moeller.
The Wildcats kicked the ball back off to Moeller after the safety and the ball was returned all the way for yet another touchdown. Moeller went up on St. Ignatius 16-0.
A great kickoff by Moeller pinned the Wildcats deep and were again forced to punt after yet another quick 3 and out. St. Ignatius was backed up deep into their own endzone to punt but this time they were successful in punting the ball away.
St. Ignatius punted the ball away and the receiver for Moeller muffed the punt resulting in a fumble which the Wildcats recovered. However, St. Ignatius didn’t do much with the ball after their fumble recovery and their offensive struggles continued forcing them to punt the ball away to Moeller once again.
Moeller’s own Tyler Joselyn picked up a nice 11-yard gain to start their 5th offensive drive of the contest. Moeller let the clock run out and the 1st quarter ended seeing Moeller up 16-0 over the Wildcats.
Moellers very first play of the 2nd quarter resulted in a deep 46-yard touchdown pass from Ponatoski down to Matthew Fogler. This gave Ponatoski his second passing touchdown of the game and Folger’s first of the game. Moeller was up 23-0 early.
The Wildcats’ offensive struggles continued in the 2nd quarter facing yet another 3 and out. St. Ignatius had to get something going and decided to go for it on a 4th and 1 on their own 40-yard line. The Wildcats went for it but before the ball was snapped a flag was thrown due to a false start. The false start pushed the Wildcats back and resulted in the Wildcats taking the offense off the field and punting the ball away.
Moellers’ Jovan Love was running hard to start their second 2nd quarter drive. He picked up a couple of nice gains of 12 and 30 yards. Love’s nice carries found Moeller all the way down on the Wildcats 12-yard line. Ponatoski found Folger once again in the endzone to make the score 30-0. This was Folger’s second touchdown of the game and Ponatoski’s third passing touchdown of the game.
St. Ignatius got the ball back hoping to finally do something on the offensive end. Anthony Anghilante found his receiver Luke Simms for a nice 34-yard pass down the field in Moeller territory. However, a promising offensive drive ended with a Moeller interception in the back of the endzone.
Moeller got the ball back after the interception and showed no signs of slowing down. Moeller came out with a balanced offensive attack that was capped off with a 46-yard passing touchdown from Ponatoski to Folger once again. This marked Folger’s 3rd receiving touchdown of the game and Ponatoski’s 4th passing touchdown of the game. This put Moeller up 37-0 with 2:05 left in the first half.
St. Ignatius got the ball back after the kickoff and hoped to do something on the offensive end. However, Moeller’s defense stood strong and forced the Wildcats to go for it on 4th and 1 which they converted. A motivating conversion for the Wildcats was ended as the first half came to a close. Moeller went into the break, up 37-0 and enforced the mercy rule to start the second half.
Moeller received the ball after the break, and they were moving the chains right away. Moeller’s one and only drive of the 3rd quarter lasted the entirety of the quarter due to the mercy rule. Moeller running back Deacon Simmons capped off the drive and quarter with a nice run of 38 yards and another 8-yard run to put them in for a touchdown. This put Moeller up 44-0 heading into the fourth quarter.
The fourth quarter started out very slow seeing the Wildcats have a quick 3 and out and Moeller’s offense going for it on fourth down and not converting. A turnover on downs by Moeller gave the ball back to the Wildcats but they were unable to do anything on the offensive end once again, ultimately being forced to punt the ball away to Moeller to end the game.
Moeller was feeding running back Deacon Simmons to run out the clock in the fourth quarter. Simmons was able to get Moeller all the way down to the Wildcats 22-yard line where they faced a fourth down. Moeller went for it and converted to get the first down. From here, Moeller took a knee to end the game.
Players of the game were Moeller’s Matt Ponatoski with 4 passing touchdowns and Matthew Fogler with 3 receiving touchdowns.
Next week Archbishop Moeller (7-1) takes on St. Edward’s (4-3) in hopes to improve on their winning season, whereas St. Ignatius (1-7) takes on St. Xavier (5-3) in hopes of getting back into the win column.
