Lake Park shuts out Conant

The first week of the football season is often strange, but rarely does it take two days to finish.

After the Conant-Lake Park game was postponed Friday night due to weather, both teams took the field again Saturday to finish play. For the host Lancers, that extra break was just right as they eventually won 17-0.

"I think last night in the meeting room after we found out it was postponed they were excited," Lancers coach Chris Roll said of his team. "We came up with a plan, the seniors ran it. They came in and they were so excited to get back here, I don't think it hurt us at all."

Play resumed with just more than three minutes remaining in the first quarter, and it took most of the remaining first half for either team to find its footing. Scoring opened up with four minutes to go in the second quarter when Kenny Jones trucked into the end zone to give Lake Park a touchdown lead.

Roll experimented with a couple of quarterbacks, with senior Mike Perry taking the majority of snaps. Despite early struggles Perry found Joe Spitalli for a touchdown to extend the lead to 14-0 in the third quarter.

"Our offensive line got the ball moving," Perry said. "Kenny Jones powered through their linebackers and I was reading the linebackers well."

Conant never did string together a full drive, mostly due to heavy pressure up front. The Cougars found early success in the short passing game, but after half-time adjustments the passing game became limited. This was all done without injured safety Antonio Shenault, sidelined by injury.

"Our defensive line was incredible," Roll said. "Our juniors that came in and played defensive back all made really nice plays. I'm very happy with my defense. A year ago we committed to being a defensive program first and I think we proved it."