By Steve Ford
EVANSVILLE — Memorial’s main concern offensively on Friday night against Belleville (Ill.) West at Romain Stadium seemed to be replacing injured sophomore quarterback Will Durchholz.
That didn’t turn out to be a problem as junior Jordan Scheessele filled in admirably. But running the ball was another matter as the Maroons stuffed the Tigers, holding them to 16 rushing yards, and made enough big plays offensively to leave with a 31-10 win.
“That’s a special group, a big-time defense,” said Memorial coach John Hurley. “We’re not going to see too many teams around here with any more athletes on that side of the ball than them.
“That’s a big school from a great league. We don’t get to schedule any easy ones.”
Memorial (0-2) actually took the early lead on the only real mistake by the Maroons in the first half when a high snap on fourth down resulted in a 7-yard loss by punter Austin Seibert.
The Tigers advanced the ball just 3 yards to the Belleville West 32, which led to a 49-yard field goal by senior Sam Stratman for a 3-0 Memorial lead halfway through the first quarter.
Then Belleville West (1-0) answered with 31 straight points, all on plays of 48 yards or more. The only score shorter than that was Seibert’s 34-yard field goal.
“The defense really did a good job tonight,” said Belleville coach Cameron Pettus. “They flew to the football, tackled and just showed up strong for us.
“Memorial is a good team with a great coaching staff that did a nice job defensively for the most part, but we had some guys make some plays and that was the difference.”
Sherand Boyd, a 6-foot-1, 190-pound junior quarterback, was 9-for-19 passing for 165 yards and two touchdowns and ran 60 yards for another score when the Maroons were trying to run out the clock late and leading 24-3.
After Boyd’s touchdown with 2:01 to play, Scheessele was able to hit Jacob Wininger for a 48-yard touchdown pass to finish the night 21 of 29 passing for 182 yards and one TD against no turnovers.
“Jordan did a tremendous job tonight,” said Hurley. “He was in the mix this summer, but won the job and Jordan was one of our receivers.
“When Will got hurt (last week in a 59-29 loss to Jasper) we suddenly needed a quarterback and a receiver. Jordan really came through and now he’ll have the chance to get better.”
“You never know what you’re going to get until you play,” said Pettus. “I was pleased with the way we were able to throw the football. That was a good job by our quarterback.
“He’s a great athlete who can throw the ball and run. We were just fortunate enough to make enough big plays offensively to go home with a win.”
