No more low-key Friday nights. If there were any.

The Chesterton football team improved to 4-0 on Friday night with a 48-13 Duneland Athletic Conference victory at LaPorte.

“We know what’s ahead of us,” Chesterton coach John Snyder said. “We’ve set ourselves up to be at a point where we have a chance to compete for the things we want to accomplish. But, we also know the meat of our schedule is ahead of us starting next Friday.

“We’ve got to line up and play smash mouth. We’ll see what we’re made of.”

The Trojans came out and made an immediate statement when Trever Walker drilled LaPorte quarterback Mike Ash on the game’s opening play, causing a fumble that was recovered by Ryley Harlow.

Five plays later, Joe Troop put the Trojans on the board with a 26-yard touchdown run. The extra point was no good and Chesterton led 6-0.

The Trojan defense forced a quick three-and-out, but the offense turned the ball over on a fumble. LaPorte responded with a 13-play drive that took 6:40 off the clock and culminated in a 3-yard TD run by Charles Salary for a 7-6 Slicer lead.

“I don't think the defense came ready to play,” Snyder said. “I hate to say it, but I think they were looking ahead (to Valpo). There is no looking ahead. We're doing some good things, but the mistakes we're making, against really good teams, are going to bite us in the butt.”

The Chesterton offense responded with six-play drive that ended with Troop’s second touchdown of the night on a six-yard scamper. Nate Needham’s kick was good for a 13-7 lead that never got closer.

The defense forced a punt and the Trojans punched it into the end zone with a four-yard touchdown run by Jon Horvath. Horvath finished with 161 yards rushing on 14 carries as the Trojans racked up 342 yards on the ground as a team.

“I said it last week, he just runs hard,” Snyder said. “Teams are trying to take away that perimeter game we have with our speed and he’s able to gain yards inside and out.”

A stop on a fourth and one resulted in another Trojan drive that Chris Katsafaros finished with a 17-yard run for a 27-7 halftime lead.

“What we've been able to do, spreading the ball around literally sideline to sideline, has got to make it tough on people," Snyder said. "Then you've got Chris (Katsafaros) at the quarterback spot that you have to account for. What we've been doing, it's given us the opportunity to take a look at things as the defense is lining up, and its nice to be able to adjust on the fly."

The Trojan offense continued to roll after halftime as Katsafaros engineered a nine-play drive that he finished himself with a three-yard run.

When LaPorte fumbled the kickoff and Kevin Fekete recovered, the Trojans took just four plays to score as Katsafaros found Troop for a one-yard TD pass. The big play on the drive was a 37-yard pass to Matt Holba.

"(The offense) gets on a roll and the defense starts to feed off it," Snyder said. “that carried over to the second half I thought.”

Chesterton’s final touchdown of the night came on a six-yard pass from Mike Crowley to Jacob Andrews.

On the night, the Trojans racked up 410 yards of total offense, while allowing just 186 (145 rushing, 41 passing).

C LAP

First Downs 18 14

Rushes-yards 44-342 47-145

Passing yards 68 41

Comp-Att-Int 6-9-0 5-7-0

Total Yards 410 186

Penalties-yards 5-35 3-25

Punts-avg. 1-49.0 2-47.5

Fumbles-lost 2-2 2-2

Chesterton 6 21 21 0 -- 48

LaPorte 7 0 0 6 -- 13

C -- Joe Troop 26 run (kick failed)

L -- Charles Salary 3 run (Josh Aaron kick)

C -- Troop 6 run (Nate Needham kick)

C -- Jon Horvath 4 run (Needham kick)

C -- Chris Katsafaros 17 run (Needham kick)

C -- Katsafaros 3 run (Needham kick)

C -- Troop 1 pass from Katsafaros (Needham kick)

C -- Jacob Andrews 6 pass from Mike Crowley (Chris Pabon kick)

L -- Miguel Barron 3 run (kick failed)

The Chesterton junior varsity team improved to 3-1 on the year with a 21-14 victory over LaPorte on Saturday.

The Trojans did all their scoring in the first half with touchdowns from Greg Mochen, Dax Jones and Tyler Gillespie.

The defense was led by linebackers Tommy St. Germain, Jaycee Jensen and a strong secondary that broke-up numerous attempts by the Slicers to move the ball through the air.

The Chesterton freshman team rallied late for a 21-14 victory over Michigan City on Thursday.

With the score deadlocked just before the half, the Trojans forced a Michigan City fumble, but the Wolves recovered and scampered 54 yards for a touchdown and 6-0 halftime lead.

In the third quarter, Logan Hofferth intercepted a pass and went 22 yards for a touchdown to tie the score at 6-6. Sam Tilden’s point-after-touchdown put the Trojans up 7-6.

A Wolves touchdown and two-point conversion put them on top 14-7 before Luke Finke picked off a MC pass and went 46 yards for a touchdown. Matt Estill took in the two-point conversion.

The final Chesterton touchdown of the night came when Garrett Slatcoff hit Caleb McEuen for a 6-yard TD. The big plays on the drive included a 32-yard run by Slatcoff and a 20-yard pass to Colton Tuzinski.

Defensively, Justin Sellers ended Michigan City’s final drive with an interception.

Posted 9/10/2012