Troy Football Falls 28-13 At Home To Clarkston

Football teams don't usually score without holding the ball.

The varsity football team could barely get its offense on the field early Friday night and fell behind Clarkston 21-0 before halftime. The Colts couldn’t overcome the three touchdown deficit and lost 28-13.

Clarkston opened game with a lengthy 14-play drive that set the tone for the rest of the game.

“The best defense is a ball control offense,” Clarkston head coach Kurt Richardson said. “We had the ball the whole time. If they don’t have the ball they can’t rush it. What’d they have 18 total plays in the first half? It’s tough to do much with 18 plays.”

Before the Colts final possession of the half, they had only managed 12 yards and no first downs. The Wolves had 337 yards and 10 first downs at that point.

Troy would manage a nice drive to end the half, but it ended with a blocked 34-yard field goal.

“What we had been doing successfully the two weeks prior to this, happened to us tonight,” Colts head coach Gary Griffith said. “They controlled the game with their offensive line, we’re not pretty big up front, they are pretty big up front. I think they had an eight-minute drive the first time they had the ball. Ouch.”

Troy (2-2; 2-1 Oakland Activities Association Red) stopped the Wolves opening drive at the goal line on fourth-and-one, but any momentum the defense created by making a goal line stand didn’t last long.

The Colts offense went three-and-out and quickly gave Clarkston the ball back with good field position.

Three plays later, quarterback Mitch Baenziger scored the first of his three touchdowns, scrambling outside the pocket to complete a 10-yard pass to Joey Goss. The senior broke two tackles and turned the short pass into a 54-yard touchdown.

“Mitch does a lot of things for us, he can run the ball, throw the ball,” Richardson said. “He’s just a great athlete, he’s point guard on the basketball team.”

Baenziger struck again in the second quarter by taking a draw play 42-yards for a touchdown. The Colts had Clarkston backed up on a third-and-22, but couldn’t make a tackle in the open field on the speedy senior.

“Big plays killed us for whatever reason,” Griffith said. “I’m going to have to look at film, but anytime someone popped a crease they just ran. Our open field tackling was not very good. The quarterback scramble I felt killed us.”

Clarkston (2-2; 2-1 OAA Red) added one more big play when running back Evan Montgomery burst through the line for an 87-yard run, setting up a 3-yard touchdown run from Goss.

The Colts staged a comeback in the second half, scoring two touchdowns in the fourth quarter. Quarteback Justin Losey capped a 75-yard drive with a 6-yard touchdown run to make it 28-7. Troy followed by recovering an onside kick that resulted in a 3-yard touchdown run from senior Matt Oppenlander.

“Our offense got going a little bit, but it wasn’t nearly enough,” Griffith said.

A missed extra point made it 28-13 and that’s where the score would stay.

A second onside-kick attempt was recovered by Clarkston, which then finished up the game with three more first downs to run out the final 6:15 on the clock.

“They controlled it up front both ways, offensively and defensively, we didn’t have an answer for them,” Griffith said. 

Friday's loss drops the Colts the middle of the pack in the OAA Red. Troy could have pushed Clarkston’s record to 1-2 in the OAA Red with a win. Instead, the Wolves picked up a crucial win after having to forfeit two wins this week for playing an academically ineligible player.

Troy will head to West Bloomfield, another 2-1 team in the OAA Red, next Friday at 7 p.m.