SPORTS

Chillicothe romps past McClain

Brock Netter

CHILLICOTHE — A week before a huge showdown with Clinton-Massie, Chillicothe handled its business with a 70-7 rout of the McClain Tigers.

The victory gives the Cavaliers (5-2, 4-0 SCOL) a five game winning streak as they hit the final stretch of their schedule.

“We’re peaking at the right time,” Chillicothe coach Ron Hinton said. “We’ve come a long way since those two losses to start the season. But now we’ll find out who the cream of the crop is in these final three games. Everyone is jockeying for that league title and those playoff points. We just have to go out and take care of what we can do.”

McClain (0-7, 0-4) received the ball to start the game and went three and out. Following the Tigers’ punt, Nate Rosenbauer took the opening hand off and went 48 yards for a touchdown as Chillicothe took an early 7-0 lead with 10:29 left in the first quarter.

The Tigers went three-and-out once again and punted the ball back to the Cavaliers.

On the first offensive play, quarterback Jack Busch found Quintin Davidson for a 67-yard touchdown pass, pushing the Cavalier lead to 14-0 with 7:29 left.

Chillicothe’s offense was just getting warmed up.

After another McClain punt, the Cavaliers struck again on the first offensive play as Busch would find Kristian Boltenhouse for a 57 yard-touchdown toss, extending the lead to 21-0 with 4:54 left in the first quarter.

“I didn’t expect to score that fast. I was really impressed by that,” Hinton said. “Our first three offensive plays and we scored, that’s credit to the offensive line. They did an excellent job for us tonight. This was the first time we started the same five offensive linemen in back to back games this year. They blocked pretty well and opened holes for our guys to run through and make plays. I’m proud of their effort tonight.”

On the first play of the second quarter, Rosenbauer dashed 31 yards for his second score of the game, pushing the Chillicothe lead to 28-0 with 11:51 remaining. Less than five minutes later, Busch found Matt Valentine, who shook a defender to complete a 24-yard touchdown pass, making the score 35-0 with 7:02 to play in the half.

At that point, Hinton took most of his starters out, making way for other players to get some valuable playing time. However, that didn’t mean the scoring was over.

Following an interception by Brandon Maughmer, he took over for Busch at quarterback and threw a 23-yard touchdown pass to Boltenhouse with 1:20 left in the half, making the score 42-0.

Following the break, Maughmer found Davidson for a 49-yard score making it 49-0.

Jakob Staggs took a handoff on the next Cavalier possession and sprinted 40 yards for a score, extending the lead to 56-0.

McClain, for the first time in school history, scored against Chillicothe’s defense as Alex Hollar ran for a 43-yard touchdown, making it 56-7.

Connor Mathis took the ensuing Tiger’ kickoff 84 yards to the house, setting the score at 63-7 and on the next Cavalier possession, Dylan Hughes would barrel down the sidelines for a 25-yard touchdown run to round out the Cavaliers’ offensive outburst on the night.

“A five game winning streak, we’re happy with that,” Hinton said. “A lot of our guys were able to make some big plays for us tonight. Now we have to get back to work and T.C.B; take care of business. It’s going to take a huge effort and a perfect football game and we have to hit on all cylinders.”

The Cavaliers outgained the Tigers 510-175 as Busch led the Cavaliers, completing 4-of-5 passes for 150 yards with three touchdowns. Maughmer was 4-of-4 passing for 82 yards and two touchdowns. Rosenbauer had 11 carries for 174 yards with two scores and Davidson was the leading receiver with three catches for 119 yards and two touchdowns. Boltenhouse finished with two receptions, resulting in two touchdowns.

For the Tigers, Tristan Pitzer was 2-of-9 passing for 54 yards with an interception and Hollar had 28 rushes for 101 yards and a touchdown.

Now that the McClain game is behind them, Hinton and the Cavaliers turn their attention to next week, when they will travel to Clarksville for a showdown with Clinton-Massie.

“This is what high school football is all about,” Hinton said. “These are the games you play for and these are the types of games our guys should expect to be in. We’ve worked all winter, spring, summer and fall for games of this caliber and now they’re here and it’s time to find out how bad we want it. We’ve had two close losses to them; it’s time for us to break through.”