JACKSON — The Saxony Lutheran Crusaders took the field for the first time on their own turf Friday, marking the first-ever football game in Crusader Stadium by topping visiting Massac County, Ill., 42-28.
“Finally, finally, we’re able to play our own place,” said Saxony Lutheran coach O.J. Turner. “Playing at [Southeast Missouri State University’s Houck Stadium] is pretty cool, pretty surreal for myself and [assistant coach Jeromy McDowell] since we played college ball there and be able to take our kids there and play, but finally being able to come to our own home, something we could call ours, was pretty special.”
Turner said he had many people to thank and that he was overwhelmed with the response from fans.
“I want to thank the administration, donors, fans — It was crawling with people,” Turner said. “We had a really, really good fan base, but making our first-ever real entrance to our stadium through our blow up, and we had [an Air Evac Lifeteam helicopter] that came in and dropped the ball — there were a lot of moving parts that the school and everybody did a really good job to be able to pull it off. So just even before we even got a chance to play football, it was pretty darn cool.”
Before the game, the field was dedicated to the late Mike Bennett, whose son, Ross Bennett, is another of Turner’s assistants.
“That was cool in itself,” Turner said.
The excitement in the air carried over from the tailgating crew to the field, as the Crusaders put on a solid offensive display to break a four-game losing streak and put a real positive spin on the new stadium.
“They pulled out all the stops,” Turner said. “I think we had half of the stands full probably an hour and a half before the game even got going. We had really good tailgaters. It was really good for a new program that’s just starting to have that much support.”
With all that build-up, the Crusaders, 3-4 in their first season of varsity football, were determined not to disappoint, taking an early lead and staying in control through the final whistle.
Sophomore quarterback Kai McDowell completed 18- of-26 passing attempts for 268 yards and a touchdown with 1 interception, scattering his passes among seven receivers.
Tucker Teague finished with 2 catches for 61 yards and a touchdown, Bryce Gaebler had 5 catches for 58 yards, and Ozzie Turner had 3catches for 9 yards. Zach Roth, Madden Cortez, Alex Buerck and Jaron Anderson had 2 catches each for a total of 140 yards.
On the ground, Alan Rudd led the Crusaders’ rushing attack, carrying 10 times for 73 yards and 2 touchdowns. Buerck had 12 carries for 38 yards and a touchdown, and McDowell had 6 carries for 16 yards and a touchdown.
“The game was good,” Turner said, adding that the Crusaders’ defense was the real star. “We did some good things, and we’ve got some things we need to improve on. We’re a little light in the britches on defense. Every week, we’re trying to get some of these young kids’ confidence up to know that they can they can really play with anybody. This week was good for that. We got some stops, we got some three-and-outs, and we had two pretty big fourth-down stops.
“They ultimately got a little desperate and started putting the ball in air and kind of exposed a couple of our young guys, but for the most part we were able to get enough stops and our offense was able to put enough points on the board to be able to give us a good win.”
Up next for the Crusaders is a road game at Red Bud, Ill., on Friday. Kickoff is scheduled for 7 p.m.
