Vanyn Fultz (21) of Marysville zeros in on a Grove City ball carrier. The Monarchs dropped a 49-0 decision to slip to 2-3 on the season.
(Journal-Tribune photo by Chad Williamson)
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Grove City’s Matthew Papas led the most complete dismantling of a Marysville defense by an opposing quarterback in decades, if not the entire history of the program.
After opening the game with an incompletion, Papas completed 25 of his next 26 passes for 419 yards and six touchdowns en route to a 49-0 drubbing of the host Monarchs.
In the first half alone, Papas was 21-for-23 for 350 yards and five scores. With the senior signal caller under center, the Greyhounds hit the end zone on seven straight drives.
“We blew a couple of coverages early, got behind, and it snowballed on itself,” MHS coach Brent Johnson said. “That’s on me and we’ll come back.”
Papas had a sniper’s accuracy, delivering short, intermediate and deep balls on target every time. Although J.J. King was his favorite target with nine grabs for 174 yards, Papas spread the wealth, delivering TD strikes to five different receivers.
Almost as surprising as its aerial efficiency was Grove City’s ability to control the line of scrimmage on defense. The generally potent Monarch ground game was bottled up for just over 100 yards as the offense could muster only seven first downs.
“I was confident coming in and it got away from us,” Johnson said. “We’ve got to go on, figure out some things and we’ve got to get back to being physical.”
In truth, the Greyhounds controlled every facet of the game. The Monarchs were not sloppy with the ball, having only one turnover, and did not make mental mistakes, with only six penalties.
They were were simply outmatched.
Papas threw touchdown passes of 24 and 49 yards on the first two drives of the game. He engineered a third scoring drive, capped with the only GC rushing touchdown, a 15-yarder by Ayden McKinstry.
Grove City went into the second quarter with a 21-0 lead and Papas didn’t let up. He threw two more scoring passes of 45 and 10 yards, but on their sixth and final drive of the half it looked like the clock might be the only thing to keep the Greyhounds out of the end zone.
With 1:45 left in the half and a 35-0 lead, the visitors picked up a big gain on a hook-and-ladder play.
The clock ticked under 30 seconds with the Greyhounds still in their own territory.
Determined to stay perfect on scoring drives, Papas launched a 47-yard completion to Cale Snyder that put the ball at the 10-yard-line with 10 seconds left in the half.
Papas hit King in the end zone on the next play as the Greyhounds pushed the lead to 42-0 with five seconds left in the half.
Marysville made its only trip into the red zone on its first drive of the third quarter.
Matt Krutowskis picked up a first down on a tough 16-yard run.
MHS quarterback Brevin Bourquin hooked up with Luke Montgomery for a 21-yard gain.
The drive stalled out at the GC 14 where the Monarchs faced fourth-and-6.
They got popped for a penalty and moved back five yards.
Bourquin was then sacked as the Monarchs turned the ball over on downs.
With a running clock in the second half, Papas made good on his final drive before being pulled, going four-for-four and picking up his sixth TD with a 17-yard pass to Parker Toadvine that closed out the scoring at 49-0.
Second teamers from both teams played most of the fourth quarter.
The loss drops the Monarchs to 2-3 on the season and sends them into the league portion of their schedule with a bitter taste in their mouths.
Johnson said the Maryville grid program is built on clawing back from adversity and he expects nothing different moving forward, despite the lopsided nature of the loss.
“We’ve built this over six years on our culture and one of the parts of our culture is ‘on to the next’ so they’ve got to live it and we’ve got to live it as coaches,” Johnson said. “I know our coaching room will be busy this weekend.”
The Monarchs will host Hilliard Darby on Friday.