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Valley to host speedy but winless Hammond Morton; Caston to travel to NM; Winamac seeks first win at Pit since 2013; Culver seeks to end 5-game skid vs. Triton
BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS
Sports Editor, RTC
Whitko (0-2, 0-1 Three Rivers Conference) at Rochester (1-1, 1-0), 7 p.m.
Rochester had 269 yards rushing against Wabash in a Week 1 win, but Tippecanoe Valley held them to 127 yards on the ground in a 22-12 loss in Week 2 in the Bell game.
Brant Beck had 90 yards rushing, 73 of which came in the second half, against Valley, but no other Rochester back had more than 16 yards.
Having said that, Rochester never got inside the Valley red zone in the second half.
“I think it was a little bit,” Rochester coach Ron Shaffer said when asked if depth was a factor. “They were running a few more guys out there than we were. A lot of guys are going both ways, and that’s kind of where we’re at right now. We’re working on that depth. … And it’s hard to be in absolute total great game shape in just two weeks. So today it wasn’t a factor would be lying. Yeah, they wore us out a little bit, but we still had our opportunities.”
Defensively, Shaffer said the team did not defend the back side well against Valley counters and cutbacks. The Vikings finished with 297 yards rushing.
“And in those situations, you have to make plays in space,” Shaffer said. “So we have to be better at our open-field tackling in those situations. What we say, you know, you’ve got to play on that fence on that back side. You can’t get too far upfield. A couple times we were out of position, and a couple times we just didn’t make plays in the open field, so we’ve got to be better at that.”
Shaffer said that Xavier Vance will play defensive tackle exclusively against Whitko tonight. Liam Pinder will start at offensive left tackle, the spot that Vance manned the first two weeks. Also, Kale Shotts will rotate in at defensive end to try to “alleviate some stress on those guys that have been playing full-time there.”
Shaffer said he still continues to see Beck as both a fullback and a halfback in the wing-T. Beck had more success as a halfback than as a fullback against Valley.
“We’re still trying to find a little bit of our identity as far as what are we going to hang our hat on,” Shaffer said. “We’ve got some time to figure that out, so we’re going to still mix it up with him a little bit.”
Shaffer said the attitude in the locker room has been “pretty good” since the loss. Rochester has lost the last six Bell games. They are 3-2 the week after the previous five Bell game losses. They have won the last two post-Bell games by a combined score of 76-6.
“I guess the one thing about losing this darn thing the last three or four years is we’ve figured out how to recover from it quickly,” Shaffer said. “My first year here, you would have thought it was the end of the season. And now our kids have realized with some playoff success and knowing they can have some playoff success… they feel like there are other things and other goals that we can meet as far as a TRC championship and a sectional championship and on through the playoffs. Our kids have a feeling that they can still call it a successful season. The Bell game is just one part of our season.
Whitko senior running back Trevor Freel leads the team with 57 yards rushing through two games. Crew Ebbinghouse has completed just four of 17 passes through two games, but he is averaging nearly 40 yards per completion. Riley Harman leads the team with 119 yards receiving.
Rochester has won the last six meetings against Whitko by a combined score of 247-36, including a 42-0 win in South Whitley last year.
Hammond Morton (0-2) at Tippecanoe Valley (2-0), 7 p.m.
Valley made it six straight Bell game wins with a 22-12 win over Rochester Friday, and their 38-0 win in the JV game at Rochester on Tuesday portends well for the future.
Symbolic of Valley’s resilience is junior Grady Moriarty. Moriarty threw an interception on a halfback pass and lost a fumble in the first quarter, but he also churned forward for 60 yards rushing on 13 carries against a Zebra defense coming off five shutouts in its last nine games. And he also led the defense in tackle points from his outside linebacker spot.
“I think he got angry,” Valley coach Stephen Moriarty said. “He doesn’t like to mess up very much, so I think he finally got angry and started playing better. Got mad a little bit. And when he did that, you could tell. His effort on defense, he stepped up quite a bit and led the team in tackles for this week’s game, and I think oart of it was just being frustrated on the offensive side early on. In the second half, he started running the ball harder and harder and making sure he held onto it.”
Defensively, Valley shut out Rochester over the last three quarters and held them to 182 yards of offense. Their reward was staying at No. 8 in this week’s USA Today Class 3A media poll.
“We were keying on Beck quite a bit being the fullback,” coach Moriarty said. “We just had to shift our focus as a defense to make sure we were accounting for their power sweep and belly to account for him running the ball. … So trying to bring him down was a challenge, but I think our kids adapted well.”
As for Hammond Morton, they improved from one win in 2022 to five wins in 2023, but they are 0-2 so far this year with losses to Duneland Conference opponents Portage and Chesterton. Now they have a one hour and 45-minute drive from Lake County to Kosciusko County awaiting them.
Quarterback Holland Harris threw for 206 yards in a 36-23 loss to Chesterton last week, and he ran for another 74 on just seven carries. He also has a star in Dashawn Woods, who had five catches for 99 yards and two touchdowns last week and another five carries for 53 yards on the ground.
And the Valley defense might have to stop Lebron – Lebron Hill, that is, who had five catches for 97 yards last week.
“They have so many different weapons that they can throw to,” coach Moriarty said. “And their quarterback is a very good runner. He’s hard to tackle and bring down, and the thing is he’s smart about it. If everybody’s pretty well locked up and covered, he’s going to take off and run. And that’s one more aspect of defense that you have to make sure you’re accounting for is him scrambling around and getting those extra yards.”
Coach Moriarty said Hammond Morton runs a 3-5 defense and is known for their blitzing. He said the offensive line must communicate well and abide by their rules to diagnose the blitzes and block the extra rushers.
Valley has won 19 consecutive regular season home games. It’s believed that Hammond Morton is the first Class 5A opponent that Valley has hosted since Warsaw in 1999.
Caston (0-2, 0-0 Hoosier North) at North Miami (2-0, 0-0), 7 p.m.
Caston had 211 yards rushing on 7.8 yards per carry last week even though they were playing without sophomore running back Landen Rigney. But they also lost four fumbles and lost 14-13 to North White.
Due to lightning, North Miami had to wait a day but defeated Sheridan 27-17 Saturday to improve to 2-0. They received their first poll recognition of the season at No. 14 in the Class 1A USA Today poll. While Caston has not had a winning season since 2012, North Miami has not had a winning season since 2017.
This is the teams’ first meeting since Caston beat North Miami 34-28 in the 2020 sectional quarterfinals. This is their first regular season meeting since a 41-8 North Miami in September 2018.
North Miami has kept the ball primarily on the ground – 89 rushing attempts, only three passing attempts – through two games. Kody Whann leads North Miami with 225 yards rushing.
Caston and North Miami were two of the original members of the Three Rivers Conference. They are conference rivals for the first time in close to 50 years.
Winamac (1-0, 0-0) at Pioneer (1-1, 0-0), 7 p.m.
Lightning and an inability to procure officials for a potential Saturday makeup date meant that Winamac had an idle week last week. Meanwhile, Pioneer fell to Class 3A, No. 7 Knox 57-6.
Pioneer has won eight of the last nine meetings in the series, including back-to-back 38-0 wins in 2022 and 2023.
This could be a battle of running quarterbacks – Xavier Adriano for Winamac and Micah Rans for Pioneer, but it could also be a battle of fullbacks between Winamac’s Addison Allen and Pioneer’s Noah VanMeter.
Winamac won the 2013 regional at Pioneer, but they have not won at The Pit since.
Culver (1-1, 0-0 Hoosier North) at Triton (1-1, 0-0), 7 p.m.
Culver will try to bounce back after a 28-16 loss to West Central in which they led 16-14 going into the fourth quarter. Like Culver, Triton won their opener but also lost last week, dropping a 21-3 decision to Bremen.
Ethan Binion had a team-high 44 yards rushing for Culver against West Central, but the rest of the team had only 20 yards combined on the ground. David Hite had three catches for 90 yards and a touchdown, and Caleb McCuen also had three catches.
Triton relies on quarterback Ben McFarland and running backs Jayden Overmyer and Vincent Prater.
Triton has won the last five meetings, including last year’s 56-0 sectional semifinal win. Triton has won the last three meetings by a combined score of 156-6.
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