Avon Dominates Lakewood 56-7

This post is brought to you by Mad Mac’s in Lakewood.

Lakewood, Ohio – The Avon Eagles took down the Lakewood Rangers 56-7 behind a big night by Avon’s defense.

The Rangers turned it over very early in the game after a fumble inside Avon territory, but Avon gave it right back.  Ryan Maloy’s first pass of the game was tipped in the air downfield and intercepted by Spencer Reynolds. After the teams exchanged punts, Avon recovered a fumble inside of Lakewood’s 10-yard line.  

On fourth and goal from the one-yard-line, Danny Zeh threw it over the middle and it fell incomplete. Coach Elder talked about the early offensive struggles, “The other team practices too. We came out and tried some things that we haven’t been very good at and we still aren’t very good at them.  Our defense got us rolling there and once they did our offense played very well.”

After a 59-yard pass from Matt Wilhelmy, Avon’s defense stepped up.  Avon hit Wilhelmy as he threw and it was intercepted by Niko Pappas and was returned 90 yards for the touchdown.  On the very next drive, Avon’s defense came up big again. Noah Mangan intercepted the ball and ran it all the way back to the end zone for the score. “They had two pick-sixes and scored the first 14 points,” Coach Elder said.

“I would say they certainly got us the momentum and at that point, things really started rolling on both sides of the ball.”

Niko Pappas got another interception on the next drive and returned it to Lakewood’s 10-yard line.  The very next play, Nick Perusek ran it in for the Eagles bringing the score to 21-0. The defense finished with four interceptions, all of which came in the first half.

After a Lakewood punt, Ryan Maloy threw a 10-yard touchdown pass.  The Rangers rolled the dice and went for it on fourth down and four inside their own 30-yard line.  Albert Wilhelmy’s pass fell incomplete and the Eagles took over. Danny Zeh threw a touchdown from 18 yards out less than 15 seconds later.

After Avon turned it over on downs inside their own 20 yard-line it looked like Lakewood had their chance.  The next play Wilhelmy threw an interception in the end zone. Within seconds Ryan Maloy threw a 68-yard touchdown pass.  With two minutes left, a 70-yard touchdown pass from Ryan Maloy to Jake Parker ended the scoring for the first half and Avon carried a 49-0 lead into the locker room.

On Avon’s opening drive of the second half, the team drove down the field and the drive was capped off by a Cole Zamborsky 38 yard touchdown run.  Lakewood drove and scored on the first play of the first quarter. A 20-yard touchdown pass from Matt Wilhelmy to Evan Hampton made the score 56-7 in favor of the Eagles.

With the loss, Lakewood moves to 1-6 and will play host to Westlake next week.  With the win, Avon moves to 6-1 and will take on North Ridgeville on the road.

Player of the Game: Niko Pappas is the player of the game for Avon.  He had three interceptions and returned one of them back 90 yards for a touchdown.