Pups defense dominates
Dave Carson saw a young quarterback harassed for four quarters and wanted to make sure the bumps and bruises didn’t turn into scars that might linger on past a late summer Friday night on Gonzaga Prep’s football field.
Only the quarterback was Lucas Schindele, who had just seen his Bellarmine Prep Lions caged by a relentless Bullpups defense, 48-7.
“I talked to their sophomore quarterback and told him I know how he feels having to face our defense,” the G-Prep coach said. “Our sophomore quarterback has to face that same kind of treatment every night in practice.”
Powered by a defensive line that frequently raced Schindele to the pocket, the Bullpups defense limited Bellarmine to three-and-out on its first four possessions and recovered a fumble on the Lions’ third play of their fifth drive.
Schindele did not have time to locate a receiver on his first four pass attempts, dumping the ball into an empty zone incomplete to avoid taking a sack.
Meanwhile, G-Prep’s offense was efficient.
Quarterback Max Manix engineered a seven-pay, 54-yard drive on the Bullpups’ first possession to open the scoring. Senior running back Johnny Jones carried from the 4 to inside the 1 before fumbling into the end zone, where guard Daniel Lampert fell on the loose ball for the touchdown. Junior Bryan Karwacki fielded a bobbled snap on the extra point and scrambled into the end zone for a two-point conversion to make it 8-0.
Manix took his offense on a 99-yard, 13-play march to start the second quarter – having a 73-yard scoring run called back on an inadvertent whistle before capping the drive with a 25-yard scoring strike to John McKenna.
Manix added a 41-yard scoring run late in the second and set up a fourth touchdown with a 32-yard pass to Phil Joy that gave G-Prep a first down at the Bellarmine 1, where Jones converted to send give the Bullpups a 28-0 halftime cushion.
The senior quarterback found Michael Alexander with a pair of second-half touchdowns that covered a combined 81 yards before taking a seat for the final quarter.
The G-Prep defense gave up just 95 yards rushing – mostly by Schindele in the second half on option plays. The sophomore rushed 12 times for 60 yards.
Karwacki moved to inside linebacker for the game, replacing junior Luke Sicilia, who is out for the remainder season and faces surgery on his injured shoulder next week.
“We’re pretty good on defense,” Carson said. “We should be. We put our best players on defense and turn them loose.”
He was especially pleased with his defensive line.
“All I know is that I don’t like having to block those guys every day in practice,” he said. “They’re all three-year starters and they can get after it.”