Spartans can’t take down Blue Devils’ Melendez

NORTH ADAMS – One of the county’s top running backs, Jose Melendez, ran through, around and over the Spartan defense last Saturday.

Melendez’s crushing blow was a multiple tackle-breaking romp from 37-yards out for a touchdown. The touchdown run in the second quarter put the Blue Devils up for good, before prevailing 36-16.

“Jose has been a workhorse all year,” said Drury Head Coach Bill Bryce. “It’s nice to have [Melendez] have a good game, but like I told the guys, the [reason] he was able to have a good game was because the frontline did a nice job today.”

The Blue Devils’ bigger and more formidable offensive line paved the way for Melendez to run for over 150 yards, while fellow running back Alex Bush had over 75 yards on the ground as well.

It was the third consecutive loss for the Spartans, who will be without star running back Malik Wilbon the rest of the season for undisclosed reasons.

“It is what it is,” Monument Mountain Head Coach Todd Tinker said after the loss. “You can’t arm-tackle [Melendez] like that, it’s not going to happen with the field conditions suited for a tough runner – they did a good job.”

The Spartans (1-6) got on the board on their opening drive as they recovered an onside kick, keyed with a big run on a quarterback keeper by Ryle O’Brian.

Jesse Dupont punched in the final four yards, while the Spartans converted on the two-point conversion to go up early 8-0.

From that point on, the Blue Devils were relentless at their “three yards and a cloud of dust” approach and pounded the ball up the middle.

Drury’s only pass completion of the game came on a fourth down in the third quarter from the Spartans’ 30-yard line.

Isaiah Clark ran a crossing pattern and was free underneath, where Nolan Bird found him wide open for the catch over the middle. Clark easily cruised the rest of the way, untouched, to put the Blue Devils up 20-8.

“Where you get into that position, where it’s fourth and long, we just ran a double-crossing route, and Isaiah Clark ran free underneath and it looked like their guys ran into each other and gave him an open lane to the end zone – nice throw by Nolan and the offensive line did a nice job with no pressure,” Bryce said.

Melendez added his third touchdown of the game at the end of the third quarter to seal the Spartans’ fate, providing the Blue Devils with a comfortable 28-8 lead.

For the Spartans, they added a nice fourth quarter touchdown on a pitch and catch between Peter Oggiani and O’Brian from 20 yards out to cut the deficit to 36-16.

Yet Monument struggled with too many penalties, which has been the team’s Achilles’ heel all year.

“You can’t take your touchdowns off the board with penalties and you can’t take away 30-yard gains with dumb penalties – that’s your game,” Tinker said.

Tinker remained positive afterwards, despite the loss of Wilbon, and praised senior Brandon Curtin, who filled in at running back nicely, gaining 60 yards on eight carries.

“[Curtin] stepped it up with Wilbon gone, “ Tinker said. “It’s time to take on a new attitude – you can’t rely on one kid and we figured that out and we played a lot better than the scoreboard shows.”

The Blue Devils (2-5) will host Lee this Saturday in hopes of finishing the season at .500.

Posted by Tim Davis on October 25, 2012. Filed under High School Sports,Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry