St. Edward defeats Archbishop Hoban 41-20 in preparation for playoffs

The Eagles handed Archbishop Hoban its first loss of the season

LAKEWOOD, Ohio - In a battle between the top two football teams in their respective divisions in Ohio, St. Edward used its physicality and big play ability to wear down Archbishop Hoban in a 41-20 victory.

St. Edward (9-1) became the first team to score more than 20 points against Hoban (9-1), while also stifling star Knights’ running back Lamar Sperling in the second half.

It was the Eagles backfield that dominated the game on the ground, led by senior running back Marvin Bell.

“We have a plethora of backs and we wear on you as the game goes on,” St. Edward coach Tom Lombardo said. “We’ve owned that fourth quarter and physicality, that’s kind of what we pride ourselves on.”

Bell rushed for three touchdowns and 137 yards on 16 carries after taking over for senior Josh Gribble, who left the game with an apparent injury after he fumbled the ball in the first quarter.

St. Edward junior quarterback Casey Bullock found plenty of success of his own running the ball, as he ran 17 times for 136 yards and two touchdowns with one lost fumble.

“Our line was tremendous this week,” Bullock said. “They studied really hard throughout the week. We really knew we had some advantages and we really executed well and the whole line just performed well, as they always do, and made it easy for me.”

Lombardo said the difficulty of his team’s schedule made Bullock’s development challenging, but that it has started to pay dividends.

“He just didn’t have any time to find himself and breathe,” Lombardo said. “I think the second half of the season he’s really learned to do that and take control. You know, he dropped some snaps today, so we’ve got to get back to the fundamentals there, but all in all a really nice job.”

Bullock was also 8-of-15 through the air for 131 yards and a touchdown.

He is not satisfied with those passing numbers though.

“I think there’s a lot more work to be done,” Bullock said. “I think we have so much more potential with the athletes we have out there. Once we tune up that timing and I get the ball to them, we’ll be way more dangerous than we are now.”

Sperling, a University at Buffalo commit, found his usual success in the first half, gaining 87 yards on the ground and scoring two touchdowns. But in the second half, the Eagles bottled Sperling up as well as any team has all year, holding him to just 44 more yards.

Sperling finished with 121 yards and two touchdowns on 26 carries.

“We took it as a challenge to tackle (Sperling) and get him to the ground,” Lombardo said. “And for the most part we swarmed them and (had) gang tackling and got him down. I’m really proud of our kids and staff, we did a great job in preparation.”

Without their usual production in the run game, the Knights struggled to get their passing game going, with the exception of a 30-yard hook up between junior quarterback Jacqai Long and freshman Payton Cook.

Long was 8-of-16 for 112 yards, one touchdown and one interception, which was picked off by sophomore Bradley Eaton to seal the win for St. Edward.

“We were uncharacteristically making mistakes,” Hoban coach Tim Tyrrell said. “And you can’t do that against St. Ed’s. We’ve gotta be able to take advantage and we just didn’t do that tonight, and that’s not what the character of this team is.”

The Eagles defense only got better as the game went on, increasingly stuffing runs and finding its way to Long when he dropped back.

“(We had) ball control, a couple big plays in the pass (game), you know, that’s a recipe for success,” Lombardo said. “If you can stop the run and run the ball yourself and create a couple big plays, you’re gonna be tough to beat.”

Though Hoban (Division II, Region 9) and St. Edward (Division I, Region 1) came into tonight with the number one playoff seed in their respective regions locked up, neither team gave a thought to resting starters or coasting to the postseason.

“I never rest guys, to be honest with you,” Tyrrell said. “We never have that mentality and I know Tom (Lombardo) doesn’t either. It’s one of those situations where that kind of doesn’t respect the game of football to me.”

Bullock said that the game meant even more due to the high rankings of the squads.

“We took it personally,” he said. “They’re near us, some people had them ranked above us, some people were telling us to take the week off and rest up for playoffs. But you know, we take on every challenge. We wanna take on the best teams in the state or in the country. So, we took it personal and came out here and balled out.”

When asked if he could imagine a better way to end the regular season and head into the playoffs, Lombardo said, “I don’t think I can.”

Photo Gallery (photos by Mike Cook)