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SELINSGROVE – The Shamokin Indians used stellar defense and some long, time-consuming offensive drives to pick up a 16-0 victory over Selinsgrove Friday night at Harold L. Bolig Memorial Stadium.
Shamokin staked itself to an early lead and then bled clock all night, possessing the ball for over 16 minutes in the second half of the game to earn the win.
Special teams was a big factor in the game for the Indians, as the team scored nine points on special teams in the game.
“I don’t know that there’s another team locally that spends more time on special teams than we do.” said Shamokin coach Henry Hynoski. “We spend a good half hour every day on that and as you can see its paying off. We got one (blocked punt) against Milton and we got two tonight.”
Despite an early opportunity, the Selinsgrove Seals stayed scoreless throughout the night. On the team’s first possession of the game, a punt was muffed and recovered by the Seals at the Shamokin 29-yard line. Despite gaining four yards following the fumble recovery, a 42-yard field goal attempt by Karmyne Cole drifted wide left and kept the game scoreless.
Shamokin got on the board on the team’s second drive of the game. On a second-and-ten at the Indians’ own 30-yard line, Ian Paul broke off a run on an inside handoff, taking the ball 67-yards before being run down from behind by the Selinsgrove defense. The 67-yard run was the longest play of the entire game by far and set the Indians up inside the Seals’ five-yard line. Two plays later it was teammate Maximus Madden that broke the plane of the endzone for the game’s first score.
On the Seals’ ensuing possession, the Shamokin defense stood strong and forced a three-and-out. The Indians then stepped up on special teams and blocked a punt that rolled all the way back into the Seals’ own endzone. Corey Adams fell on the ball for the Indians, giving the team a 14-0 lead with 4:12 remaining in the opening quarter.
Shamokin’s special teams practice paid off again late in the opening half. Following a sack by Micah Miller, the Seals’ were punting from deep in their own territory yet again. Once again the punt was blocked – this time by Aaron Frasch – and careened out the back of the endzone for a safety, putting the Indians up 16-0.
In the second half of the game, it was all Indians’ but no additional points were added to the scoreboard. The visitors used long, methodical drives to get deep into enemy territory before often turning the ball over on downs in attempts to score.
“We preach to the kids to bend, don’t break” said Selinsgrove coach Derek Hicks. “I told them that tonight was a little too much bend. The problem is these long drives are taking 8-10 minutes off the clock, which is time our offense doesn’t have to try to get things going.”
On Shamokin’s first drive of the second half, the team put together a 14-play drive that ate 8:05 off the clock. The drive covered 55 yards and the Indians converted on third down three times en route to picking up four first downs on the drive. The drive stalled out following back-to-back false starts and a sack from Selinsgrove’s Ryan Aument.
In all, the Indians possessed the ball for nearly 30 minutes of the 48 minute game.
“In all my experience playing football, time of possession, turnovers and penalties are the things that win you football games,” said Hynoski. “Its always good to win the time-of-possession battle, the turnover battle and the penalty battle.”
Shamokin nearly had a pair of 100-yard rushers on the night, as Paul ended up leading the team in rushing yards – thanks to his 67-yard jaunt – carrying the ball 10 times for 97 yards. Madden followed closely behind, toting the ball 23 times for 94 yards.
Selinsgrove’s passing attack came to life in the second half. At the halftime break, Selinsgrove quarterback Coy Bastian had thrown for only nine yards, he finished the game with 93 passing yards, thanks to nice nights from receivers Brett Foor – four receptions for 53 yards – and Frasch – four receptions for 42 yards.
Perhaps lost in the shuffle of the incredible all-around performance by the Indians was the team’s defense.
Shamokin’s defense limited Selinsgrove to just four total yards in the first half and just 101 total yards in the entire game.
“They were loading the box. I knew we had to be able to pass the ball a bit in order to loosen up the front, but unfortunately we didn’t get that going.” Said Hicks.
“The defense was lights-out the whole game.” Added Hynoski. “I thought we did really well on offense, especially running the football. We were able to get some nice time-consuming drives in, we just shot ourselves in the foot a few times.”
The win is a big one for Shamokin, who improves to 2-1 on the season and will host Shikellamy (1-2) next week.
“Overall, the effort and the physicality was there.” said Hynoski. “Selinsgrove is a physical football team. Hats off to them but we came to play hard.
“We got the monkey off our back, we got two (wins) in a row. We have to continue with the intensity. We can’t be complacent or slack off in practice.”
Meanwhile, the Seals fall to 1-2 on the season following back-to-back losses. The team will look to get back on track next week, though they will be facing an incredibly tough Jersey Shore team that has outscored opponents 149-14 through three games this season.
Shamokin 16, Selinsgrove 0
SCORE BY QUARTERS
Shamokin 14 2 0 0 — 16
Selinsgrove 0 0 0 0 — 0
First Quarter
Shamokin—Maximus Madden 1-yard run (Carson Ososkie PAT Good), 5:54.
Shamokin—Corey Adams fumble recovery (Ososkie PAT Good), 4:12
Second Quarter
Shamokin—Blocked punt SAFETY, 1:47.
TEAM STATISTICS Sham Sel
First downs 13 6
Total yards 282 101
Rushes-yards 48-219 17-8
Yards passing 63 93
Passing (comp.-att.-int.) 5-13-0 9-30-0
Fumbles-lost 2-1 2-1
Penalties-yards 8-65 4-43
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
RUSHING—Shamokin: Ian Paul 10-97, Madden 23-94 TD, Aaron Frasch 11-41, Brett Nye 2-(-4), TEAM 1-(-9). Selinsgrove: Coy Bastian 11-5, Ryan Straub 1-4, Ryan Aument 5-(-1).
PASSING—Shamokin: Nye 5-13 63 yds. Selinsgrove: Bastian 9-30 93 yds.
RECEIVING—Shamokin: Micah Miller 1-30, Ryder Zulkowski 2-19, Paul 1-12, Madden 1-2. Selinsgrove: Brett Foor 4-53, Frasch 4-42, Aument 1-(-2).
