{"id":68323,"date":"2015-09-26T08:17:24","date_gmt":"2015-09-26T13:17:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/?p=68323"},"modified":"2015-09-26T08:17:24","modified_gmt":"2015-09-26T13:17:24","slug":"cougars-dominating-in-win-over-kenton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2015\/09\/26\/cougars-dominating-in-win-over-kenton\/","title":{"rendered":"Cougars dominating in win over Kenton"},"content":{"rendered":"

DAVE MOSIER\/<\/b>independent sports<\/i><\/p>\n

It\u2019s been 20 years since Van Wert has beaten Kenton, and the Cougars did it in dominating fashion on Friday with a 38-0 shellacking of the Wildcats in front of a home crowd at Eggerss Stadium. The last time Van Wert defeated Kenton was in 1995, when Kent Smelser coached the Cougars.<\/p>\n

\"Cougar<\/a>
Cougar quarterback Colin Smith (8) uses some fancy footwork to get loose for a gainer during Friday night’s game against Kenton, which was won by Van Wert 38-0.<\/strong> (Jan Dunlap\/Van Wert independent)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Van Wert compiled 409 yards of offense — 172 yards on the ground and 237 yards through the air — to just 160 yards for the Wildcats, all but 53 yards of that being passing yardage.<\/p>\n

The Cougars scored on their first possession when quarterback Colin Smith took the ball in from the Kenton 15 with 10:32 left on the first-quarter clock. Gavin Gardner kicked the first of five extra points and Van Wert led 7-0.<\/p>\n

After a failed Kenton drive, the Cougars again pushed the ball upfield in a drive that culminated in a 17-yard touchdown run by Justice Tussing, the first of two touchdowns for the Van Wert running back. Gardner kicked the PAT for a 14-0 lead for Van Wert.<\/p>\n

The Cougars scored three times in the second quarter, the first on a 9-yard run by Tussing, the second a 34-yard field goal by Gardner and the final score of the quarter on an 18-yard pass from Smith to Josh Braun with just 31 seconds remaining in the first half, and went into the locker room at halftime with a 31-0 lead.<\/p>\n

Despite some second-half faltering, Van Wert\u2019s defense held the Wildcats scoreless in the second half as well, while the Cougars got their final touchdown with 6:01 left in the game when Smith connected with Nick Gutierrez on a 12-yard scoring strike that made it 38-0.<\/p>\n

Smith was Van Wert\u2019s leading rusher with 88 yards and a touchdown on 14 carries, while Tussing was close behind with 84 yards and two TDs on 17 carries. Trent Hites was Kenton\u2019s top rusher with 43 yards on 13 carries.<\/p>\n

Ryan Stoller was the Cougars\u2019 top receiver with four receptions for 60 yards.<\/p>\n

With the win, Van Wert is 3-2 overall and 2-2 in the Western Buckeye League, while Kenton falls to 1-4 overall and 1-3 in the WBL.<\/p>\n

The Cougars will travel to Elida next week for a league match-up with the Bulldogs, who 2-3 overall and 1-3 in the WBL. Van Wert is currently fifth in the league, although it has the third best record behind undefeated Wapakoneta, St. Marys and Celina, all tied for first place at 4-0, and 3-1 Ottawa-Glandorf.<\/p>\n

\"VW<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DAVE MOSIER\/independent sports It\u2019s been 20 years since Van Wert has beaten Kenton, and the Cougars did it in dominating fashion on Friday with a 38-0 shellacking of the Wildcats in front of a home crowd at Eggerss Stadium. The last time Van Wert defeated Kenton was in 1995, when Kent Smelser coached the Cougars. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-68323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-23 02:31:30","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68323\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}