Riley, Benet let football fly

All it took was a glance out the window during school Friday and Benet quarterback Jimmy Riley just knew he was about to experience a signal-caller's worst nightmare.

After all, with the rain beating down all day, who could blame Redwings coach Gary Goforth for calling about 100 running plays in that night's East Suburban Catholic Conference opener against visiting St. Joseph?

So imagine Riley's surprise when Goforth said the passing game would still play an integral role in the game. And imagine the unlikely sight of Riley slicing up the Chargers defense to the tune of 216 passing yards and a pair of touchdown tosses as the Redwings recorded their first win of the season in a 35-0 whitewash.

"Before school ended I looked out the window and told coach that it was looking a little bumpy, that we're gonna have to run it," Riley said. "He said we've got solid receivers, a solid game plan so we'll go out and play our game."

The unlikely tone was set on Benet's first possession as Riley knocked the Chargers (2-1, 0-1) back on their heels with a 51-yard scoring pass to Marty Flavin on a fourth-and-32 play. Before the half was over, Riley would complete 12 of 16 passes for 188 yards, capping the effort with a 26-yard TD strike to Mac Coffey that made it 21-0 at the half.

"Hey, we threw it in the rain, I was very happy," Goforth said. "We still need to establish the run, but when you're not running it, you've got to be able to throw it and I thought our receivers made some nice catches."

The Redwings made some hay on the ground, too, as Riley notched a game-best 59 yards on 8 carries, while Mike Wuest counted touchdown runs of 8 yards and 1 yard among his 47 yards on the night. Luke Terna closed the scoring with a 4-yard plunge with 12 minutes to play.

On the defensive side the Redwings (1-2, 1-0) dominated a St. Joseph team that was sky-high after scoring a total of 86 points in two games in recording its first wins after 45 consecutive losses since joining the ESCC in 2003.

Led by Mike Vanchieri, Phil Schmidt, Joey Sterner, Connor Kuhn and Victor Sadauskas, Benet held the Chargers to 85 total yards and just 9 in the second half.

"We played well last week (against Montini, 14-6 loss) and our kids think we should've won that game," said Goforth. "I'm proud of the way we responded. We gave them the game plan and they executed it."