Last week, Alexander had the game it had been looking for all season.
The defense stifled any type of offensive momentum, the offense got things going on the ground and grinded yards when needed and it felt like the Spartans found their ability to have a sustained, productive offense.
The only question was if they could replicate the success they had right away or if they would have to work their way into it.
On Friday, Alexander got its answer. It just wasn’t the one it was looking for.
Nothing went the Spartans’ (1-4, 1-3 Tri-Valley Conference-Ohio) way in their 31-0 loss to Vinton County (3-2, 3-2 TVC-Ohio), as the offense never found its footing in the game, and the failure for the offense to establish itself caused the defense to have to play catchup for most of the game.
For Coach Earich Dean, the offensive struggles come from the same issues that have plagued the team all season: unnecessary penalties and debilitating negative plays. No drive showcased what type of night it would be for Alexander more than its opening offensive drive.
Starting the drive at their own four yard line, the Spartans drove all the way down the field and found themselves in the Vinton County 35-yard line, then fumbled the ball and allowed the Vikings to scoop and score to take an early 7-0 lead.
Dean saw too many promising drives end without any points added to the board because of sloppy mistakes and he will keep hammering that point home until those mistakes stop.
“We hurt ourselves,” Dean said. “We had drives, but if you look inside those drives, we had mistakes that just absolutely killed us. They were able to wear us down and put some points on the board.”
Vinton County did indeed wear the Spartans down, as Alexander’s first offensive drive of the third quarter saw them already trailing 25-0. As the second half went along, Dean felt the game starting to slip away from his team and wanted to see something different with the offense.
Xander Karagosian was taken out at quarterback late in the third quarter and replaced by freshman Jordan Schulz. According to Dean, the move was mainly due to a combination of wanting to see Schulz’s ability against high level competition and wanting to lessen the amount of unnecessary hits on Karagosian.
Schulz didn’t change much in terms of Alexander’s offensive output, but Dean like what he saw from his freshman quarterback.
“I think Jordan Schulz is going to be a tremendous quarterback for us in the very near future,” Dean said. “To me, It was a good time to let Jordan go in against a really good football team and let him have some reps and get used to the speed. Xander ran the ball hard for us, but I can’t let him take too many hits when the game’s pretty much already decided.”
The Spartans put together a disappointing performance after how well they played against River Valley last week, and now, with only one game left in the shortened season, they will have to do what they can to end the season on a winning note next week.
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