We all knew coming into the season that Xavier had an abundance of speed. Sean Murphy and Nick Stark, for example, had proved in 2014 that they were hard to catch in the open field. Maliki Wilson had a great year at tailback on the sophomore squad, and he was ready to move up to varsity. Couple that with a pretty smart, experienced junior quarterback in Bryce Schulte, and you figured the Saints were going to be able to move the ball downfield pretty well.
We're four games into the 2015 season. Here's a couple of numbers for you. The Saints have scored 17 touchdowns so far. The average length of scoring plays?
It's 34.6 yards.
That's freakin' unbelievable. Putting up 17 touchdowns in 4 games is good, but not outrageously high scoring ... but averaging nearly 35 yards on each touchdown play? That's ridiculous. It does make you wonder, can Xavier continue to count on the big plays throughout the rest of the season and playoffs, or are we living in a fools' paradise, as they say on the Swiffer commercial?
Let's move on to last Friday night's contest at Maquoketa. Going into the game, we had a matchup between the two teams at the top of Class 3A District 4 - both Xavier and Maquoketa were 2-0 in the district, with Xavier at 3-0 overall and the Cardinals at 3-1. Maquoketa had a rough go of things in 2014, with an extremely young team loaded with sophomores and juniors finding their way. At least in the early going this year, those now-juniors and now-seniors looked to have figured it out. Their only loss was to powerhouse West Delaware, and they were coming off a stirring comeback win over Dubuque Wahlert - after falling behind with 35 seconds left, Jacob Kloft returned the kickoff all the way for the winning touchdown. The Cardinals' resurgent season took a step back, though, with the 42-13 loss to Xavier on Friday.
The tone of the game was set on the second play. The snap went over the head of Maquoketa quarterback Justin Snyder, and the loose ball was recovered by Xavier's Nolan Armstrong at the 16. On the next play, Wilson carried over the right side and into the end zone, and the Saints were up less than a minute into the game.
Let's not forget to praise Xavier's defense in this early season run. Coach Jim O'Connell has his guys playing typical lights-out Xavier defense, flying to the ball and doing a fine job of shutting things down. This game wasn't much different, as the Cardinals managed only 4 first downs in the entire first half (including one by penalty and one on the next-to-last play of the half). After the D stopped Maquoketa on two three-and-outs, the Saints offense shifted into high gear.
Xavier scored on all but one possession of the first half. A 15-yard run by Wilson made it 14-0. Schulte fired a deep pass to Stark as he ran past his defender across midfield, and he pulled away for the 72-yard TD just before the first quarter ended. On the second play of the second quarter, Wilson started on a sweep left. It was plugged up by Maquoketa, so he reversed his field all the way to the right sideline, picking up some blocks (including a nice one from Schulte), then spinning past the final defender for a 65-yard TD run. The next time the Saints had the ball, Schulte threw a high lob over two leaping Maquoketa defenders that fell into the hands of Nolan Butkowski for a 20-yard scoring pass. And to cap off the first half, Wilson's 56-yard run got Xavier rolling, and his 16-yard touchdown made it 42-0. That run put Wilson right around 200 yards rushing with 4 touchdowns ... in the first half. The four scores tied a Xavier school record. For a game, not just a half.
With the continuous clock running and the scout teamers in the game, the second half went by quickly. Maquoketa finally got on the board early in the fourth quarter, taking advantage of a long punt return by Kloft into the red zone, with a 17-yard pass from Snyder to Lincoln Aunan for the score. The Cardinals' woes didn't stop, though. Cam Thede, likely the best kicker in District 4 (he hadn't missed an extra point and was 6 of 7 on field goals, including a 43-yarder), kicked the extra-point try directly into the line of blockers ahead of him. Maquoketa got another touchdown on a pass from Aunan to Andy Ahrens to stop the continuous clock, but there were only 36 seconds left.
A couple of notes about Goodenow Field - I thought it was charming. And I mean all the positive and negative things that can go along with such an adjective. Visitor seating was small, the press box was cramped, parking was catch-as-catch-can, the high school locker rooms were three-quarters of a mile away so the teams had to bus back and forth ... but it was still a neat atmosphere. The field itself was in fantastic shape. Even though there wasn't much for bleachers, a hillside wrapped around the west side of the field, allowing grass seating for the Xavier student section, along with others. The city water tower loomed over the west side, as well, and you could see the middle school building just about a half-block away (obviously that was the original high school building, so the location of the football field made sense at that time). Energetic music played loudly during pregame warmups, making it almost a college-type atmosphere. And the Maquoketa team ran down the northwest hillside, through an archway labeled "Alumni Alley," to take the field as they were introduced. I thought it was a pretty neat, for a small-town environment. Different than what Xavier players and fans are used to back in the 4A days, but this is 3A football. Charming. That's a good description.
With Maquoketa dispatched, it appears Xavier has a pretty good hold at the top of District 4 - although I think I said the same thing last season, when Western Dubuque came to Saints Field and left with a 7-6 victory (a really odd game, though - Schulte did not complete a pass in the rain, Xavier's only touchdown came from the defense, and a bad snap cost them the extra point and the game, it turned out). Western Dubuque is struggling mightily this season, however, and while the Saints can't afford to overlook anybody, it seems this year's Xavier team is capable of handling the Bobcats in Epworth this coming Friday. After that it's Wahlert for homecoming (the Golden Eagles were neck and neck with Maquoketa, then came from behind to defeat Western Dubuque last week), the non-district match with Iowa City Regina, and then a Marion squad that's really, really searching to get anything going. So, again, I said this last year and turned out to be wrong, but at this point it appears Xavier is in the driver's seat for the District 4 title. It also may be shaping up for a possible matchup of 6-0 Xavier against 7-0 Regina in Iowa City on October 16, which would be a huge, huge game here in eastern Iowa. Or is it yooge? Is that how we're saying it these days?
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