NANKIN — Mapleton built some momentum after back-to-back wins, but Firelands Conference power St. Paul played angry Friday at John E. Camp Stadium.
After starting the season 0-3 for the first time since head coach John Livengood’s first year leading the program in 1991, the Flyers got offensively methodical against the Mounties in a 49-30 win.
Mapleton quarterback Kollin Cline put together a monster night, accounting for almost 300 yards of offense and throwing two touchdowns to Logan Conroy. But St. Paul (1-3, 1-0) scored on every one of its possessions until taking a knee at the end of the game on a night when the Mounties (2-2, 0-1) were trying to win their FC opener for the first time since 2018.
“St. Paul’s gonna be St. Paul; their record doesn’t mean anything,” said Mapleton coach Matt Stafford of the Flyers, whose three losses came to teams that are a combined 11-1 after Friday night’s action. “They played a heck of a nonconference schedule. Them being 0-3 did not mean anything to us.
“We knew how good they are, we knew how well they’re coached and we knew they were going to bring it.”
St. Paul improved to 30-3 in both FC openers and against Mapleton under Livengood, and the Flyers entered Friday having not lost a league-opening game since 2004. While the Mounties got within 34-30 late in the third quarter, they had no answers for the St. Paul running back duo of Josh Pocos (20 carries, 249 yards, two touchdowns) and Brock Houck (11 carries, 76 yards, three TDs).
Houck had just eight carries entering Friday but stepped in for lead running back Ben Burger, one of a variety of starters out due to injury for the Flyers, who still rushed for 433 yards on 43 carries Friday.
“(Injuries and illness) really put a lot of pressure on our older kids and a lot of younger kids, too, to step up and step into different roles this week,” Livengood said. “This is a team that I really love and care about. … I’m really proud of them to just keep fighting through.
“We hit the reset button (after the 0-3 start), that’s something we talked about. We can’t control the past, we can only control what’s happening next.”
St. Paul’s first two touchdowns of the game came from Brady Daley. The senior hadn’t scored yet this season, but busted off a 56-yard touchdown run on the game’s first drive, then caught a 9-yard touchdown pass from quarterback Drew Kuhnle (5-of-7, 64 yards) on the Flyers’ second drive.
But Mapleton largely was up for the challenge early, also scoring on its first drive when a 49-yard Cline-to-Luke Pryor pass set up Kline’s first touchdown toss to Conroy, an 11-yard score.
The Mounties were within 20-14 with just 1:33 left before halftime after Kline rolled right and found Conroy again, this time for 19 yards in the right corner of the end zone.
“(Kline and Conroy) put in a lot of hours in the summer,” Stafford said, “so that connection, I’m glad to see it manifest on the game field because we see it on the practice field.”
St. Paul, though, took advantage of its last possession of the first half. After marching 94 yards on 15 plays in 6:29 on their third scoring drive, the Flyers covered 54 yards in 75 seconds to head into halftime up 27-14.
“The kids really knew how important that drive was,” Livengood said. “To go in at halftime with a two-score lead was very important.”
The late score left Mapleton playing catch-up for the entire second half of a game that didn’t have a single turnover.
Conroy scored on a 7-yard run for the Mounties to open the second half and Pryor went in from 4 yards out with 1:10 to play in the third. Kline’s last of three two-point conversion runs in the game made it 34-30 at that point, but the St. Paul defense put up a pair of fourth-down stops in the fourth quarter and pulled away.
The loss dampened yet another hard-nosed night for Kline. A week after running for nearly 300 yards in Mapleton’s 40-33 win over Northmor, the senior bulldozed his way to 200 rushing yards on 28 carries Friday while going 5-for-7 for 94 yards and the two touchdowns to Conroy through the air.
“Kollin fought his butt off, our offensive line fought their butts off, our backs were sustaining their blocks,” Stafford said. “It’s just that we had a couple mistakes in there on offense and they didn’t; they executed flawlessly on offense.
“It doesn’t get any easier for us. Western Reserve is running the ball well, Monroeville’s running the ball well. We’ve got to figure out how to stop the run.”