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South Elgin rolls past St. Viator

In the end, it was a pretty obvious choice.

When South Elgin and St. Viator found themselves without Week 1 opponents due to COVID cancellations, they decided to simply play each other. They met in South Elgin Friday night, with the Storm taking the impromptu nonconference matchup, 48-7.

Mason Montgomery ran for 3 touchdowns, Jake Sullivan tossed 2 touchdown passes to Jalen Jones and ran for another, and Jones returned a punt for a score to lead the Storm.

It was an odd week of preparation for both teams, not knowing if they would even play Friday, much less who the opponent would be.

"[It was] just good coaching, discipline, make sure we're always ready, practicing hard, being ready for any opponent," said Sullivan of the Storm's approach in practice. "Just playing how we play.

"Coach was getting us ready. We're going to do what we've got to do, and whoever we play, we'll be ready for them."

"It doesn't matter who we play, we've just got to do what we do best," Montgomery said.

The Storm was scheduled to play Fenton in an Upstate Eight matchup, but the Bison had to cancel due to COVID issues.

"I'm glad we got a game in," said South Elgin coach Dragan Teonic. "I'm grateful to St. Viator for coming out here and accepting our bid to play. We had a forfeit victory, but to not play would have put us behind and it was good for these kids after 36 practices in summer and fall."

Even though the Lions came out on the short end of the score against the bigger and more experienced Storm, they were happy for the chance to play.

"We were grateful to be able to take the field," said St. Viator coach David Archibald. "That's what our guys want to do, that's what they're prepared to do. It wasn't under ideal circumstances but our guys came out and they battled."

The Lions were already outmanned, then lost starting quarterback Alex Konopka to injury in the second quarter. Sophomore Charlie Dolsen took over and performed well, getting St. Viator on the board with a 22-yard scoring strike to Michael Nix.

But the first 3 quarters were all South Elgin. After punting for the only time on their first possession, the Storm took the lead with 2 touchdowns in less than a minute. Sullivan hit Jones to put South Elgin ahead with 5 minutes to go in the first quarter. After St. Viator fumbled the ensuing kickoff, it took just 2 plays for the Storm to find the end zone again, with Montgomery racing around right end from 20 yards out.

Montgomery added scoring runs of 11 and 65 yards in the second half and finished with 159 rushing yards. Sullivan finished 7 of 12 for 87 yards, mostly in the first half and added 32 yards on the ground.

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