As the Section III football regular season wound down, Bishop Ludden stood at extreme ends of the Class C West division – one undefeated, the other winless.
Both were at home Friday night, and the pattern continued. The Gaelic Knights toyed with LaFayette/Fabius-Pompey in a 52-7 romp, while the Eagles had some real chances against Hannibal before falling to the Warriors 28-20.
Ludden had played at Hannibal six days earlier, dropping 54 points, and kept up the torrid offensive pace against a much-improved LaFayette/Fabius-Pompey squad, bolting out to a 17-0 first-quarter lead.
Though short of the end zone on its first drive, the Gaelic Knights still took a 3-0 lead when Chris Davis converted a 22-yard field goal.
Soon after, Omar Osbourne took over, scoring from six yards out to make it 10-0, then torching the Lancers’ defense again by breaking loose for a 70-yard TD run before the period ended.
That pace slowed in the second quarter, as LaFayette scored on Jerome Gibson’s 11-yard run to answer Devin White’s five-yard run and make it 24-7 before halftime.
Ludden would not allow a point again, and slowly got away in the second half with 28 unanswered points.
Osbourne launched the flurry, going 71 yards for his third TD of the night as he finished with 189 yards on the ground. Quarterback John Rooney joined in, too, breaking loose for TD runs of 54 and 30 yards, before the reserves came in and Antoin Montgomery scored on an 18-yard run in the fourth quarter.
Just a few miles to the west, J-E was itching to break its three-game skid, but Hannibal would not allow it.
Zach Stevenson returned a blocked punt 14 yards for a touchdown to give the Eagles a 7-0 edge in the first quarter.
But Warrior quarterback Alec Nelson answered, throwing an 11-yard TD pass to Zach Welling and running 18 yards for another, as J-E trailed, 14-7, going into the second quarter.
The Eagles’ defense stepped up, blanking Hannibal the rest of the first half, and the special teams struck again when Leland Holmes returned a punt 56 yards for a TD. Only a missed conversion kept the Eagles down, 14-13, going into halftime.
It turned in Hannibal’s favor again in the third quarter, with Josh Lewis scoring on a one-yard run and Mike Sherman going 27 yards for another TD to make it 28-13.
J-E wouldn’t quit, as Preston Bishop sprinted 55 yards for a fourth-quarter TD and Liam Corfield made the PAT to cut the margin to eight. Still, J-E could not get closer.