West Holmes (8-2, 6-1) took it to the Mount Vernon Yellow Jackets (2-9, 1-7) on Friday night, going up 42-0 after one quarter and never looking back in a lopsided 62-0 win to finish the regular season on a six game winning streak.
The Knights were led by quarterback Morgan Smith, who put up video game numbers going 25-for-31 for 459 yards. He threw six touchdown passes, which gives him a total of 34 touchdown passes on the season.
Three of those touchdowns passes were to Kyle Maltarich, with the Yale commit finishing the regular season with 12 receiving touchdowns. Nate Fair had two touchdown catches in the game and has 11 on the year. Graham Martin had his other touchdown catch, which was his first of the year.
West Holmes scored 35 points in the first quarter. With 10:50 left in the first quarter, quarterback Morgan Smith launched a touchdown pass to a wide open Maltarich for 34 yards. They scored again with 5:42 on the clock with Smith throwing another bomb to Fair who was wide open in the end zone to go up 14-0 on a 25-yard catch. With 4:30 on the clock, Maltarich picked off a Jake Taylor pass and ran it back untouched for 50 yards to make it a 21-0 game.
They went up 28-0 on another Maltarich touchdown catch with 3:03 on the clock. Smith eluded a Mount Vernon rush, side stepped and threw a bullet to a wide open Maltarich from 11 yards out. With 17 seconds left in the quarter, Nate Fair caught his second touchdown of the game on a nasty leaping catch in the back corner of the end zone for a four-yard score.
The Knights followed with a 14 point second quarter. With 9:35 left in the quarter, Smith was out of shotgun and had all day to throw. He launched a bullet to Maltarich who juked and eluded defenders for a 50-yard score. Backup quarterback Gus Warner then ran one in from a yard out at the 7:42 mark. With 41 seconds left in the half, Smith connected with Martin for seven yards to make it 56-0 at the half.
The only score came in the second half with 8:53 left in the fourth quarter, on a one-yard touchdown run by Brody Bowman to complete the shutout win.
Maltarich and Fair each had interceptions for the Knights, showing that they are a force to be reckoned with whenever and wherever they are on the field.
In total West Holmes had 442 yards of total offense and Mount Vernon had 165 yards.
Mount Vernon had 38 carries for 92 yards rushing with Jonny Askew leading with 18 carries for 32 yards. Mason Richards tallied six carries for 35 yards. Mav Gregory had nine carries for 11 yards. Taylor had four carries for 15 yards.
Mount Vernon was 9-for-20 for 93 yards and two picks in the air. Taylor had both interceptions, and was 6-for-13 for 50 yards. Askew caught three passes for 17 yards. Hayden Higgens and Ethan Young each had one catch for 25 yards.
West Holmes has been dominant during their winning streak, and on the season they have outscored opponents 391-233. They have the most points of any team in the OCC by 88 points, and second being conference leading Mansfield Senior.
The No. 4 Knights face No. 13 Bryan (5-5, 3-4) in the opening round of the Region 18 OHSAA tournament on Friday at 7 p.m. at home.
