Marquette’s defense smothers Chicago Christian in 41-0 win

OTTAWA – The belief that teams make their greatest improvements from Week 1 to Week 2 is not always true, but it would be tough convincing fans at Marquette’s Gould Stadium on Friday night, because they really liked what they were seeing from their Crusaders.

Against Palos Heights Chicago Christian, the Crusaders stepped up their game in nearly every facet, but particularly on defense where they held the visiting Knights to a mere 5 yards rushing on 24 attempts and to 59 yards of total offense for the game on the way to a 41-0 victory.

Offensively Marquette looked like its old self, getting 88 yards and two touchdowns on nine carries from Tommy Durdan and 79 yards and two TDs on 17 rushes for Jurnee Reed.

Also, the passing game of quarterback Alex Graham picked up where it left off in the hot second half of the Week 1 win over Aurora Christian, connecting on 5 of 6 tries for 70 yards and two scores, both to end Caden Eller.

The two backs each scored TDs as the Crusaders raced to a 21-0 first-quarter lead, then the second scoring aerial to Eller widened the gap to 27-0 at the half, aided by the defense’s limiting CC to negative-18 yards and just one first down in those opening quarters.

The Knights hung tough in the latter three periods, moving linebacker Brock Spurling into the line and blitzing often to force a turnover and two Cru punts in four possessions.

However, that just delayed the running clock until Durdan’s 22-yard scamper to paydirt with 8 minutes, 23 seconds left in the fourth quarter.

“One thing that Coach [Bill] Novak said to us all the time,” said MA coach Tom Jobst, referencing his Hall of Fame coach at Ottawa High School, “that when teams are doing that to you, just keep punching, because eventually you’ll break them. They’ll make you look bad at times, but we kept punching, and we broke them, too. … They were blitzing more guys than we had to block them on every play. That tackle, No. 59 [Spurling], wow, he’s a good one. He was everywhere.

“[Our] defense was very good tonight. Tonight, they were a little more disciplined, lining up and executing their skills better than last week. … Once we woke up, we were able to do a few things, so yes, as a team overall, we did make a significant improvement over last week.”

The Crusaders scored on their first three possessions, the first when an 18-yard Graham-to-Charlie Mullen toss set up a 1-yard Reed dive. After one of several short CC punts, the same pass combo had a 12-yarder leading to a 4-yard Durdan burst.

Finally a fumbled kickoff return was recovered by Griffin Walker, cashed in on the next play by Graham’s 33-yard strike to Eller.

Though the Knights toughened, a pair of bad snaps and a punt blocked by Mullen and recovered by Vinnie Battestelli gave MA the ball at the Christian 41. From there, a 14-yard run by McGrath led to a 13-yard TD pass from Graham to Eller with 13.9 seconds left in the half.

Reed followed a 37-yard Durdan run to the Chicago Christian 2 with a punch in late in the third period, and a muffed punt led to Durdan’s final score.

A total of 49 of the 59 yards posted by the Knights came on the final drive of the fourth quarter against MA’s second team. Obadiah Goble rushed for 25 of those yards on four tries, while Jeremiah Oliver finished with seven carries for 16 yards.

“We made some mistakes, and that put us in a hole right off the bat, and against a good team, it’s tough to dig out of that hole,” said Christian coach Tom O’Connor, whose team blanked Chicago Sullivan 19-0 last week. “Once we stopped making those mistakes, things got better right away. … Brock is a linebacker, but he had a bit of a shoulder ding, so we moved him into the line, and it helped us … but we’re not good enough to overcome those kinds of mistakes.

“We’re very young, only seven seniors, and of those those four hardly play, but you can’t expect to make mistakes and expect to win.”