Rockford Rams 36, East Kentwood 60

By Steve Vedder
The Grand Rapids Press

The results didn't go according to plan for East Kentwood's football team, but don't expect to hear any complaints.

Not when the results actually exceed already high expectations.

That's how it went for the streaking Falcons in Friday's wild 60-36 shootout win over Rockford before 4,500 fans at Pat Patterson Field.

"You never plan on scoring 60 points," admitted East Kentwood coach John Shillito, "But at the same time if you run our offense, it goes."

Against the Rams, the offense virtually never stopped. In a matchup of top 10 teams and likely competitors for an O-K Red title, the story was a near-flawless Falcon offense that set school records in rushing and total yards (625) and first downs (31).

Three backs rushed for more than 144 yards, including senior Eric Foster who scored on runs of 10, 11, 2 and 1 yards.

East Kentwood, which entered the contest averaging 51 points per game, scored on eight of its nine possessions. The only time the Falcons didn't score was the last time they had the ball and that drive ended on the Rams 16 with 1:42 left.

Rockford rushed for 184 yards and passed for another 204. The Rams tied the game twice, the final time at 16-16 with 1:32 left in the first quarter, but the Falcons reeled off four touchdowns in the next 11 minutes for a 44-16 lead.

"It's a crying shame when 36 points can't win a football game. I have no answers," said Rams coach Ralph Munger."We did very well offensively; I was very pleased with that effort. But any time a team gets 60 points on you, you've got to look deeper and deeper for answers."

Aside from Foster's four scores, Kyle Hinton added 71 and 12-yard touchdown runs, Noel Aleman scored on a 47-yard run and Donovan Terres from 48 yards. Hinton rushed for 175 yards, Aleman 163 and Foster 144.

It was Hinton's 71-yard run on a fourth-and-one at the Falcons' own 29-yard line that snapped the 16-16 tie.

Foster said with teams keying on backs such as Aleman, Terres and Hinton, there's often daylight for him. Foster had only carried the ball 20 times in the team's first four games.

"It's great that people worry about them. They put up numbers, but we've got so much depth in the backfield and a line that can makes holes," Foster said.

While the offense stole the show, Shillito pointed to three Ram possessions in the second quarter with the score tied at 16.

"The reality is we had three stops in a row and that put real pressure on them," Shillito said of the Ram offense. "Defensively, you look at 36 points and we played fairly solid defense after the first quarter."

Rockford scored its touchdowns on 6 and 1-yard runs by K.C. O'Rourke, a 22-yard run by Drew Powell, a 32-yard pass from Andrew Wertz to Joe Staley and a 32-yard pass from Wertz to Joel Visser.

Shillito said with seven rushers having gone over 100 yards coming into the game, the Falcon's ability to run the ball becomes something of a shell game.

"It becomes a guessing game when we run the ball that well," he said. "Things get moving."

Next up: the Rams will travel to Grandville