A half is all Madison needs
Josh Slaughter, Special to The Gazette
Saturday, September 20, 2008
Photo by Jordan Haiduk
Madison’s Caleb Hamilton ran for 75 yards and three touchdowns in just one half of work on Friday against Burlingame. The mercy-rule was invoked at halftime, giving the Bulldogs a 54-6 victory.
Madison — What do you do when you only have four days between games? Well, for Madison High School, the answer was run 19 plays on offense and put up 54 points in a steamrolling 54-6 mercy-rule win over Burlingame.
“I don’t know if we looked real crisp the first two games,” Madison coach Fred McClain said. “You know, even the kids haven’t been happy with their performance. Tonight we just seemed to be firing on all cylinders, and Burlingame is a pretty good opponent.”
In the first quarter, the Bulldogs needed just six plays to rack up 145 yards and four touchdowns. They opened their scoring with a 52-yard pass from Henry Ott to Caleb Hamilton. The pass was well-executed, as Ott hit a wide-open Hamilton over the middle of the field and no one caught him as he scampered for the score.
“Coach studies the other teams and he knew they were in a four down linemen, two defensive backs and two linebackers,” Hamilton said. “He knew if we split them out to the right and ran (Michael) Luthi out to the left they wouldn’t have anyone to cover me.”
Following Madison’s TD, the Bearcats had their only substantial drive, as they went 53 yards in 10 plays for their lone score of the night. The drive was capped by a 35-yard touchdown pass from Austin Masters to Cory Smart. The point-after attempt failed, and the game was the closest it would be all night at 8-6.
Following the BHS drive, Madison needed only one play, a 26-yard run by Luthi, to score again. That was followed by a blocked punt and an 11-yard TD run by Hamilton. After another stalled BHS drive, Hamilton had his longest score of the night on a 53-yard touchdown run with 16.2 seconds remaining in the first quarter.
“We’ve got a veteran team this year,” McClain said. “I’m really excited with the enthusiasm and the effort.”
In the second frame, it was more of the same, as Luthi started the scoring with a 33-yard run to give the Bulldogs a 38-6 victory. Ott followed with a 10-yard TD run of his own to give MHS a 46-6 lead. Luthi came on for the final score, plunging in from 10 yards out for a 54-6 lead.
The Madison offense wasn’t the only story though, as the Bulldog defense forced three turnovers, including two interceptions by Reece Childers.
“We didn’t play our best on Monday, so we really needed this tonight,” Childers said. “The defensive line put a lot of pressure on tonight and just forced him to make some bad throws, and I just happened to be there to pick him off.”
Luthi finished with five carries for 118 yards and three touchdowns while Hamilton racked up 128 yards of total offense. Ott only had to throw one pass on the evening, but it was good enough to notch him 52 yards and a touchdown.
“That’s my offensive line — tight ends were getting good blocks on the linebackers, so for me it was just finding the hole and running through it,” Luthi said. “The guards were pulling and hitting everybody. I mean, that’s just what my line does.”
The offensive line was big for the Bulldogs, as MHS racked up 239 yards on the ground on just 17 carries, good for an average of 14.1 yards per rush.
“We’ve been working on their defense all week — well, since we played on Monday,” lineman Andrew McVey said. “It was the same defense as the last team we played and the offensive line did great. We knew what we were doing and when we didn’t. We talked a lot on the line asking who you have, do you have that guy.”
Madison will face another test next week when it travels to Marais des Cygnes Valley in Lyon County League play. The Trojans will bring a potent ground attack into the game with the LCL’s leading rusher.
“People are starting to figure out that Michael Luthi, Henry Ott and Caleb Hamilton are all weapons for us,” McClain said. “Marais des Cygnes is a good team though, I said that to my team in the end zone. Next week we’re going to get challenged. They are going to be the best opponent we’ve played so far, so we’re going to find out a little about ourselves next week.”
Madison 54, Burlingame 6
Friday at Madison
Burlingame 6 0 — 6
Madison 30 24 — 54
(Game Ended at Halftime)
First Quarter
MHS — Ott 72 pass to Hamilton (run good)
BHS — Smart 35 pass from Masters (conversion failed)
MHS — Luthi 26 run (conversion failed)
MHS — Hamilton 11 run (run good)
MHS — Hamilton 53 run (pass good)
Second Quarter
MHS — Luthi 33 run (pass good)
MHS — Ott 10 run (rush good)
MHS — Luthi 10 run (rush good)
Individual Statistics
Rushing — MHS: Luthi 5-118, 3 TDs; Hamilton 4-75, 3 TDs; Ott 3-23, 1 TD; Zach Nowell 3-14; Zach Fox 2-9. BHS: James Clem 12-40; Ty Lang 7-22; Masters 4-9; Chris Markley 3-7; Myles Cayton 1-2.
Passing — MHS: Ott 1-1-52, 1 TD. BHS: Masters 3-12-63, 1 TD, 2 INT.
Receiving — MHS: Hamilton 1-52, 1 TD; BHS: Smart 2-50; Broxson 1-13.
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