Recap by Kadin Rogers
The Monmouth-Roseville Titans continued their 2022-2023 campaign on Friday night in Spring Valley taking on the Red Devils of Hall High School. M-R hoped to keep the momentum going from a huge week 1 home win over Kewanee, but fell to Spring Valley 34-24.
The Titans would open the game with the ball, and established an early rhythm on offense, quickly carving up the Devils defense on the ground. Ultimately C.J Johnson would take in the score from 2 yards out, and convert the 2 point conversion to go up 8-0. Spring Valley would respond in kind on their first offensive drive, riding the run game into Mon-Rose territory and scoring on a 27 yard Quarterback run from Mac Resetich. Hall would convert their own 2 point conversion to tie the game at 8. After both offenses traded scores both defenses would trade big stops, with Spring Valley stopping the Titans on a 4th and 7 go for it call, and C.J Johnson sacking Resetich on 3rd down to end the corresponding Red Devils drive. The 1st quarter would end with a Monmouth-Roseville punt and a score of 8-8.
Spring Valley opened the second quarter with another efficient drive on the ground, eventually scoring on a 4 yard touchdown from Gianni Guerrini and a 2 point conversion from Jack Jablonski to give the Red Devils the 16-8 lead. The Titans had a response with a touchdown pass from Silas Braun to Jerome Jackson, but the play would be called back due to a holding on M-R. The Titans would be forced to punt and Mac Resetich would take the punt back the other way 75 yards to extend the Red Devils lead to 22-8. Monmouth-Roseville would get the ball back with 4 minutes to go and slowly moved into Hall territory, scoring with 9 seconds to go on a 27 yard touchdown pass from Braun to Nick Lewis-Bresnahan. A 2 point conversion from C.J Johnson would cut the lead to 22-16 to end the first half of play.
Spring Valley would open the second half with the ball, and their first offensive drive would be all Mac Resetich, setting the Red Devils up at the Titans 42 on a good return, and then scoring on a quarterback run from 27 yards out to extend the Hall lead to 12. After two penalties added to the kickoff, the Titans would be forced to start at their own 7 yard line, they would push the ball down inside the Spring Valley 10 yard line but fail to score after an endzone interception by Resetich. Hall would take advantage of the turnover and march down the field, scoring on the fourth Mac Resetich touchdown run, putting the Hall Red Devils up by 3 scores entering the final quarter of the game.
In need of a score to stay in the game, Monmouth-Roseville had a 39 yard touchdown pass from Braun to C.J Johnson but the play was wiped out by an illegal man downfield penalty, and on fourth down, Braun’s pass to the endzone was picked off by Joseph Bacidore to give the ball back to the Hall offense. The Titans final offensive drive would result in a 9 yard touchdown run and 2 point conversion from Braun, and after a failed onside kick the Red Devils would run down the clock and seal a 34-24 home win.
For Spring Valley, Mac Resetich threw just one time for 15 yards, but carried the ball 20 times for 251 yards and 4 scores. For the Titans Silas Braun completed 8 of his 15 attempts for 131 yards, a touchdown and 2 interceptions. C.J Johnson would lead the way in rushing and receiving with 111 yards on the ground and 76 yards through the air. Stats courtesy of Michael Gooding. The Titans with the loss fall to 1-1 and will be back at home next week on Saturday to play their conference opener against the Mustangs of Morrison High School.
For the replay of the WMOI radio broadcast of the game, click HERE
