ROACHDALE — In what was a future Monon Athletic Conference football matchup, the Crawfordsville Athenians traveled Friday to face North Putnam. The Athenians gave the Cougars a competitive first half trailing 22-14 at the break, but the second half belonged to the Cougars who stayed undefeated on the season with a 57-21 win.
Crawfordsville (2-2) had no answers for the ground and pound style of the Cougars. The combination of a stout offensive line and the duo of juniors Christian Kramer and Wes Murphy were too much for the Athenians too handle. Kramer tallied 202 yards through the air and 110 more on the ground while Murphy ran for 133 yards and four scores and added 36 more yards receiving.
The Athenians entered the locker room with momentum as Mason McCarty scrambled up the right sideline and stayed in bounds on his way to the longest play of the game — a 67-yard touchdown with just 23.3 seconds to go in the first half.
In the second half, the Cougars ground game got whatever it wanted, while the Crawfordsville offense failed to sustain many drives.
“We started off the game great for the most part which is a reverse of what we’ve done the last few weeks,” Crawfordsville coach Brad Clark said. “We felt good going into the second half getting that score and then getting the ball to begin to start. As the game went on, they wore us down and we stopped tackling well and doing the things that we needed to do to be successful.”
The Athenians did tally 256 total yards in the loss with 163 coming on the ground and McCarty throwing for 93 of his own. The junior signal caller accounted for 191 total yards. Maddox Ronco led the team with five catches for 79 yards including a big 55-yard catch and run to set up a score.
What plagued the Athenians was their 10 penalties which cost them 82 yards. Most of them Clark said were simply ones that his team can’t afford to have happen.
“We had some unsportsmanlike calls and what not and our kids were talking a little too much,” he said. “Stuff like that doesn’t make you successful and that’s where a lot of my focus is going to be this week with us being more disciplined.”
The next two weeks are big games for the Athenians as they will square off with both of their county rivals. CHS will welcome Southmont next week before traveling to North Montgomery on Sept. 27.
