Taft shuts out Lake View

Lake View tried to play keep-away from Taft’s offense for as long as it could in the Big Shoulders Conference Opener at Lane Stadium on Friday.

The plan worked for the first half as the Eagles only had possession of the ball for 5 minutes, 26 seconds. Yet Taft still managed to hold a 6-0 halftime lead and it marched right down the field scoring a touchdown on the opening drive of the second half to cruise to a 27-0 win.

“We’re in the spread, but we’re still a running team,” said Eagles’ head coach Matthew Walsh. “If we can spread you out, we’ll look for the creases and look for the gaps.”

Lake View (1-3, 0-1) tried to use its ball-control offense to keep Taft off the field in the first half. The Eagles (3-1, 1-0) only ran 13 plays in the first half, but took a 6-0 lead thanks to a 13-yard touchdown run by Zach Cunningham with 5:17 remaining in the second quarter.

“We needed to come out in the first half and jump on them and we didn’t,” Walsh said. “But they had a game plan and they stuck to it. They’re going to try and run the ball right down your throat and they were able to do that.”

Taft came out fired up to start the second half and quickly moved down the field out of their spread offense. A pair of big runs by Fitzpatrick Allen gave the Eagles the ball at the Lake View 7-yard line as quarterback Dominik Kuraszkiewicz scrambled into the end zone with 7:03 to play in the third.

Tony Rialmo caught a pass from Kuraszkiewicz for the two-point conversion and a 14-0 advantage.

A quick stop by the defense gave the ball right back to the Eagles and they capitalized on the opportunity as Kuraszkiewicz (5-for-9, 131 yards passing) connected with Cunningham on a 35-yard touchdown pass that extended the lead to 21-0 with 2:32 remaining in the third quarter.

Cunningham (10 carries, 84 yards rushing) completed the scoring by tacking on a 7-yard touchdown run with 1:09 to play in the fourth quarter.