Polo rolls over Westminster Christian
POLO - It's not always about the final score. For Westminster Christian, playing in its first playoff game in just its third varsity season was a victory in itself.
OK, the Warriors would have liked to have won the game, but playing an undefeated Polo team on the road with their starting quarterback out of action was a tall order. The Warriors acquitted themselves well but couldn't get past the Marcos, falling 49-6 in the Class 1A playoff opener.
Brody Grobe and Brooks Grobe accounted for 6 touchdowns for Polo (10-0). Quarterback Brody Grobe ran for 3 scores and threw for another, compiling 174 rushing yards just in the first half. Tailback Brooks Grobe added 107 yards and 2 scores, again all in the first half.
As if the Warriors didn't have a tough enough task, starting quarterback Tannor Park was lost to a broken ankle at the end of last week's game. Backup Scotty Graziano did what he could, including scoring the Warriors' lone touchdown. He completed 2 passes for 56 yards, both to Bobby Scott.
Markus Grasemann led the ground attack for the Warriors (6-4) with 42 yards on 9 carries.
The Warriors made a statement on their first possession that they weren't just happy to be there. After a good kick return by Xavier Brown, they moved to the Polo 35-yard line before running out of steam.
"I think that we put them off when Xavier caught that ball and ran it back 20 or 30 yards," said Westminster coach John Davis. "Then we got 2 or 3 first downs, and I think that they were maybe a little taken aback. But when you only have 20 or 30 guys and you're pounding them as much as you can and expecting them to do miracles on defense all the time, at some time your numbers pull you down."
Polo's roster listed 43 players compared to 20 for Westminster. Polo, which racked up 26 first downs, had 12 different players carry the ball. Collectively, they accounted for 475 rushing yards.
After Westminster was forced to punt on its first possession, the Marcos drove 80 yards to take the early lead, despite having a touchdown called back on a holding penalty. After recovering a Westminster fumble on the next series, Polo struck again and led 12-0 after one quarter. The Marcos put the game away by scoring 4 times in the second quarter.
They added a final touchdown after halftime. With the clock running continuously, the scoring drive consumed the entire third quarter, with Polo getting its final TD on the first play of the fourth quarter.
Westminster answered with a scoring drive of its own covering 60 yards. Brown again gave the Warriors good field position with his kickoff return, and Graziano finished it off with a 6-yard run.