No excuses.

The Lake Central Indians manhandled the Chesterton Trojans physically for four quarters on Friday night en route to a 35-12 Duneland Athletic Conference victory.

“They are everything that I thought they would be,” Chesterton coach John Snyder said. “They are physical. They are aggressive. They can run. I know our kids are really disappointed. It’s the first time this senior class has really had a loss like this.

“We’ll see how they respond.”

The defenses dominated the entire first quarter as neither team mounted any kind of offensive threat.

“Our defense are very similar,” Snyder said. “Proud of the kids. Proud of the effort. For the first half, everyone saw a great game. In the second half, they took advantage of our mistakes.”

Lake Central cracked the scoreboard first with 7:12 to play in the second quarter when David Yancy broke a tackle and scampered 43 yards for a touchdown.

The game remained that way until the 1:16 mark of the third quarter when Yancy again broke a tackle and went 41 yards for a 14-0 lead. Yancy finished with 113 yards on 21 carries, 97 of those yards came on three carries.

“We knew we couldn’t let Yancy get those big plays on us and for the most part we handled him pretty well,” Snyder said. “He got away a couple of times and turned them into touchdowns. That’s what great players do.”

Another long LC touchdown run, this time from 40 yards away, pushed the score to 21-0 just 11 seconds into the fourth quarter.

“I thought we played outstanding through two and a half quarters,” Snyder said. “They just wore us down. They lined up in that Power I and just ran it at us. When you’re tired already and your offense isn’t doing much to help you, that’s what can happen.”

The Trojans finally mounted a threat on the next possession as Chris Katsafaros connected with Joe Troop behind the defense for a 78-yard touchdown to cut the lead to 21-6.

The Indians response, an 80-yard kickoff return for a touchdown.

“We get a big play for a touchdown and maybe give ourselves a little bit of a chance and give up the big kickoff return,” Snyder said. “That’s something we’ve struggled with all year. And there it was again.”

The Indians added two late touchdowns and the Trojans got a one-yard TD run from Mike Crowley to set the final score.

“They physically beat us up,” Snyder said. “It’s not a matter of scheme. It was their Jimmy’s against our Joe’s and, give them the credit, they won almost every match-up.”

The Trojans again struggled hanging onto the football as they fumbled seven times, losing four.

“A lot of the turnovers was them beating us at the point of attack and creating those,” Snyder said. “We have to go back and find out what they hurt us the most with. We took some shots early and didn’t connect on them. We hit one, but that won’t be enough.

“You just can’t give them the ball over and over again.”

The Trojan defense allowed only 193 yards of total offense by Lake Central with 128 of those coming on three plays, but had just 206 yards themselves with eight minutes to play.

Posted 10/1/2012