St. Vincent football had a long road trip on Friday night and an even longer trip home.
The Indians fell in a close one 21-18 to Thayer on Aug. 25 to open the season.
“It was definitely a long day and night for us,” St. Vincent coach Tim Schumer said. “It was a good experience because if we advance in our district there is going to be some traveling for us. It was good for us to do that and learn how to deal with a long bus ride.”
Schumer said both teams experienced cramping with its players on the humid night. The game, much like most across the state, started at 8 p.m. because of high temperatures on Friday.
“The humidity and how hot it was all week was tough,” Schumer said. “At halftime I thought we were in a good place with our conditioning. As the game went on and we had guys going both ways you started to see its effects for both teams.”
St. Vincent was up 6-0 at the half, and Schumer felt like his team was doing well.
“I thought we did a good job with their defensive style,” he said. “They had some drives where they had long possessions and we were able to bend, but not break and keep them out of the endzone. We had one mistake where we gave up a 50-yard touchdown and we had a guy slip and another out of alignment. It didn’t go our way but that was really our only miscue of the night.”
Thayer scored twice after halftime and went up 14-6. Then early in the fourth quarter the Indians scored and narrowed the deficit to 14-12. The Indians went for two after the touchdown and the snap went over the quarterback’s head and the try was unsuccessful. The Indians made a stop on the next drive, but turned the ball over on a later drive that Thayer was able to take advantage of to go ahead 21-12.
The Indians scored a touchdown with one minute left and failed to get the onside kick.
Christian Schaaf threw two touchdowns, both to Jacob Schremp and ran for another for the Indians scoring drives.
St. Vincent will travel to a much closer destination for Week 2 when they take on Scott City at 7 p.m. The Rams fell to Dexter 26-14 in week 1. This will be the last year for the matchup between the two teams as Scott City is entering into a new conference next season.
“This is a good measuring stick for us,” Schumer said. “Scott City always plays us tough so we have to come ready to play.”
