Titans bounce back from loss with a vengeance

After coming up short in a Week 1 thriller against Midview, Lorain flexed its muscles, crushing Cleveland JFK, 54-0, in a nonconference matchup at George Daniel Field on Sept 1.

The Titans (1-1) dominated in every facet of the game, outpassing the Fighting Eagles (0-2) 17728, and leaving their Senate Athletic League opponent in the dust with a 277-(-43) rushing differential. It was 41-0 by halftime, and for John F. Kennedy, there was no relief in sight.

Lorain coach Dave McFarland was pleased with the bounceback win.

“Our kids feel good about themselves and we got back to playin g some better defense than we played the week before,”

fore,” McFarland said. “It’s always good to get a shutout, and a lot of kids touched the ball tonight, so that’s is always good.”

Fresh off an impressive three touchdowns in Week 1, Titans senior quarterback Justin Sturgill lit up the Fighting Eagles’ secondary in a short time, going 7-of-13 for 179 yards and four touchdowns. He was taken out, along with most of the starters, a few minutes into the third quarter.

Sturgill admitted he and his teammates were still frustrated over the loss against Midview, but that they channeled that frustration

into their Week 2 matchup.

“Of course, we weren’t trying to keep that in. You can’t forget stuff like that. You work so hard trying to get what you want to accomplish, but when you come up short, then you come up short. It’s a part of it. You just have to deal with it and move on. It’s always going to be in us, but we are going to put it away and work harder than we ever have before,” Sturgill said.

Perhaps equally as impressive was Lorain’s rushing attack. The Titans’ offensive line opened up huge holes, paving the way for running back Daylin Dower to do what he does best. The sophomore tallied two touchdowns for

104 yards on nine carries, notching back-to-back 100yard games.

“We have got a lot of weapons overall in Lorain,” Dower said.

“We got Zion Cross, Tyshawn Lighty, Daveon (Dower). It’s just a lot, a lot that we can do overall as a team and as a program.”

The aforementioned senior, Cross, showed of his All-State speed, returning a 66-yard kickoff return in the second quarter, Cross added another 21-yard touchdown reception to his box score, placing the Titans up, 29-0, midway through the second quarter.

There was seemingly no answers for stopping the Titans’ high-powered offense, at least none that

John F. Kennedy coach Reggie Walker could think of.

“It was pretty frustrating from the sense that we talked about all week playing assignment and tackling in space. We know they have great athletes all over the place. I’m also the head track coach at the school, so I know Zion very well,” Walker said. “Those are things that we talked about all week and we didn’t do. We said if we didn’t do it, that it was going to be a long night, and as the scoreboard shows, it was a long night.”

The game quickly turned ugly as Lorain’s athleticism was on full display, scoring 27 points in the second quarter, en route to a 41-0 lead at halftime.