Fast Start Leads Eagle Football Past Grossmont

The MSJC football team built a commanding lead on Saturday and never looked back as they won on the road at Grossmont 56-26.

The Eagles got the scoring started early when Sherod White capped a 9 play 58 yard opening drive with a two yard touchdown run.  MSJC added a two point conversion to grab an early 8-0 lead just over 5 minutes into the contest.  Darryl Moody then picked of a Grossmont pass on just their fourth offensive play of the day giving the Eagles great field position at the Griffon 30 yard line.  The MSJC offense cashed in 6 plays later when Devan Freedland hit White out of the backfield for a 12 yard TD pass, Javier Luna added the extra point and the Eagles were out to an early 15-0 lead.  The score would stay at 15-0 until early the second quarter when after Grossmont missed a 20 yard field goal attempt the Eagles would march 63 yards in 10 plays to score again.  This time the touchdown came on a 20 yard pass from Freedland to Rashoud Shelton, on the drive Freedland completed 3 passes to Cayden Chambers and had a big 43 yard run of his own to help set up the score.  Later in the second the MSJC special teams continued their season long dominance as they blocked a Grossmont punt giving the Eagles the ball at the Griffon 2 yard line.  Robert Coleman connected with Shelton on the ensuing play and MSJC pushed their lead to 28-0.  Grossmont would finally get into the end zone with just 1:10 to play in the half, to cut the halftime deficit to 28-6.

The Griffons showed some life early in the 3rd period when the closed the gap to 28-12 on a touchdown pass, but MSJC answered immediately with a 3 play 53 yard drive, scoring on a 33 yard pass from Coleman to Taylor Tosches.  Midway through the 3rd MSJC would balloon the lead to 42-12 when Freedland and White hooked up again, this time on a 14 yard TD pass.  In the fourth Coleman would add a 17 yard touchdown run with 10:37 to play, and with under a minute to go in the game Matthew Hicks caught a 21 yard touchdown pass from Eddie McCulloch to round out the Eagle scoring on the day.

Freedland ended the afternoon completing 18 of 22 passes for 133 yards and 3 scores, while Coleman went 6 for 12 for 49 yards and a pair of TDs. McCulloch seeing his first action of the year went 3 of 3 for 31 yards and a score.  Shelton grabbed a team high 7 receptions for 63 yards and his two touchdowns while White made 6 catches out of the backfield.  Coleman led the ground attack with 81 yards on 7 carries, as the Eagle offense totaled 414 yards for the game.

Nazier Morrow led the MSJC defense with 8 total tackles while Josh Hilton had a pair of sacks and a fumble recovery.  Moody picked off two passes for the Eagles and Kelvin Davis made 4 total tackles including a sack, a tackle for loss, and he forced a fumble.  In all the Eagles forced the Griffons to turn the ball over 5 times in the game.

The victory for MSJC was their 3rd straight and they improved to 1-0 in the American Mountain Conference.  The Eagles will travel to Moorpark on Saturday October 9th for a 6 pm game.