Middies claim shootout with Demons

It was a shootout in Westlake on Oct. 5, as the final box score looked more like video game numbers than real life.

However, Midview topped Westlake on the road, 42-28, picking up their first win of the season after losing six straight to start the year.

For the Demons, they fall to 1-6 on the year and 1-5 in the Southwestern Conference, while Midview improves to 1-5 in league play.

“Our defense stepped up when they needed to, and it was a good team win,” Midview coach DJ Shaw said. “Our goal was to score 50 points and we came close to that, but I’m just proud of this team.”

It was a back-and-forth game all night, and things remained close until Midview took the lead late in the third quarter when senior quarterback Andrew Gooch found senior receiver Edwin Ralat for a 74-yard touchdown strike, giving the Middies a 28-21 lead.

The Demons answered right back the next series, putting together a 13-play drive where senior quarterback Jacob May capped it with a 30-yard touchdown pass to sophomore receiver Dylan Bednar, making it 28-28 in the fourth quarter.

Midview struck again the very next series, this time on a 46-yard touchdown pass from Gooch to Ralat, giving the Middies a 35-28 lead with 8:45 left in the fourth quarter.

Like their series before, Westlake ripped off a large chunk of yards, as senior running back James Coleman took off for 75 yards on the first play of the series but was chased down by Ralat on the five-yard line.

“That was a huge and amazing effort by him (Ralat),” Shaw said about Ralat’s tackle at the five-yard line. “We had several plays drawn up for him tonight,

and I just thought our kids had amazing effort tonight. For a team that entered this game 0-6 and to see kids battling like that, I think it says a lot about some of these kid’s character”

Despite the Demons being able to sniff the end zone, the Middies defense was able to stand their ground, forcing two incompletions and stopping Coleman and May from reaching the end zone on their feet.

Midview sealed Westlake’s fate on their next drive, as senior receiver Isiah Johnson took off for 88-yards and a touchdown on a double reverse play for a 42-28 lead.

“It was a game of big plays,” Shaw said. “There were a ton of sustained drives, it was just a game of big plays and I thought our kids made a ton of them and it was fun to watch.”

Overall in the game, there was a total of 1,037 yards of combined offense with Westlake putting together 585 yards compared to Midview’s 452.

“That’s a good offense,” Shaw said. “They definitely exposed some weaknesses that we have, but like I said we’ll take a victory because we were hurting for one and it’s big for our program.”