Wave defense key in narron Friday night football win

Rick Stiver

Sports Correspondent

WEST CARROLLTON - Kyle Gerlach led a stalwart defensive effort by Greenville

as the Green Wave traveled to West Carrollton and went home with a 2-0

shutout in varsity football action Friday night.

Gerlach tackled Pirate running back Tony Wilbur in the end zone with 10:02

remaining in the fourth quarter for the only points of the game, and helped

hold West Carrollton at bay with a sack of the Pirate quarterback on each of

the next two possessions.

T. J. Powers, the second-year Greenville coach, said “Kyle had a heck of a

ballgame defensively; he was all over the field. We were blitzing him a

little bit tonight.”

The big plays by Gerlach were a part of the Greenville defensive scheme for

the night as the Wave raised its record to 3-1.

Powers said “Our defense was phenomenal (Friday) tonight; that’s two weeks in a row. We’re going to have to have a great defense to go where we want to go - get in the playoffs and make some noise. The adage is defense wins championships, so we’ve got to continue that defensive effort.”

Greenville’s defense allowed only four West Carrollton first downs the entire night with only one occurring after the opening period.

Two of the first downs for the Pirates came after Greenville fumbled a punt

return, giving West Carrollton the ball only 24 yards from the end zone.

Despite allowing the pair of first downs, Greenville bowed its back and came

up with a goal line stop to gain possession of the football.

West Carrollton helped the Wave cause by being called for a delay of game penalty with fourth-and-goal from the one-yard line.

Kyle Agne had a fumble recovery for Greenville while Zac Guillozet and Chris

Lockhart added interceptions.

Greenville’s scoring output was low due to an injury to third-year starting quarterback Adam Burk, two touchdowns being called back because of

penalties, three turnovers, and being unable to get into the end zone from

the one-yard line.

Burk was injured midway through the second period. Powers said “He took a

shot on the inside of his knee and it (the knee) went out.”

An exact diagnosis of the injury to the senior quarterback was to come later.

The first touchdown called back was on the first play of the game, and wiped

out an 81-yard kickoff return by Zach Melling. The second was a 19-yard run

by Melling late in the game.

The Wave gave away two fumbles and one interception, but were able to recover

another fumble.

Greenville had two fourth-quarter possessions that were stopped by West

Carrollton goal line stands from the one-yard line or closer.

“Offensively, obviously it hurt losing Adam (Burk), but even when he was in there, we were struggling,” said Powers. “They (West Carrollton) kind of beat us up front the first quarter-and-a-half. We held our own, but we didn’t

dominate like I think we should have up front.

“Give them credit,” continued Powers, “they did a great job. They played

physical; they played a real good football game.”

Powers added, “What was disappointing was being on the one-yard line and not

getting the ball in. That happened twice. We’ve got to be able to get it

in there, it’s that simple.”

Unfortunately for West Carrollton, the Pirates weren’t able to build on the

momentum the first goal-line stand should have provided, as Gerlach had the

safety two plays later.

“I’m proud of our kids for showing all the heart they did and battling

adversity,” stated Powers after the game.

Greenville’s victory kept West Carrollton winless at 0-4 for the year, which

also happens to be the record for the Wave opponent this week.

“We’ve got Thurgood Marshall Thursday night at Welcome Stadium,” said

Powers, “so we’ve got to turn around and get ready for them. If we continue

to play defense like we did (tonight) and get a little bit better

offensively, we’ll have a good shot of getting them.”