SPENCERVILLE-The Spencerville Bearcats knew that it was gong to take a full effort on Friday night if they were going to beat Paulding. Bearcats forced six Panther turnovers to pick up the 35-8 victory.
“I told them in the locker room that we needed to come out and punch them in the mouth early,” said Spencerville head coach Kyle Koenig. “Give them credit they never backed down and came at us all night long and it was an up and down game for us but we are glad to come out with the victory.”
Spencerville got the ball to start the game and picked up right where they left last week. The Bearcats took six minutes off the clock and scored on a two yard run by Carter Layman to give them a 7-0 lead.
After forcing a three out, the offense went right back to paydirt as Nate Coulter made some guys miss and raced 70 yards to the house to give the hosts a 14-0 advantage.
Spencerville scored once in the second quarter on a seven yard run in the second quarter to make it a 21-0 lead. The defense started to step up for the defense as they forced four first half turnovers to keep the doughnut on the scoreboard for the visitors.
“Our defense has helped us tons of times early this season,” said Koenig. “It was awesome to watch Grady Smith because he gave up a touchdown and comes up with an interception later on and Will Sensabaugh gets another interception and runs it to the house.”
Paulding found some momentum in the third quarter and was able to crack the scoreboard. On a fourth goal from the seven Jacob Fife was able to scramble and found the end zone and the two point conversion was successful to cut it to 21-8.
The Bearcats were without the services of Nate Coulter who injured his shoulder on a tackle in the second quarter. The Bearcats couldn’t find much momentum on offense until the final quarter.
After a Paulding turnover, Spencerville turned it into points. A pair of completions to Will Sensabaugh including a 11 yard pass to the corner of the end zone extended the lead to 28-8.
Sensabaugh put the final exclamation on the game on a 40 yard pick 6 to make it 35-8.
“It’s huge to have him with how low our numbers are and to have a freshman out there making plays and he doesn’t back down at all,” added Koenig about Sensabaugh. “He’s doing a great job the first two weeks and looking forward to see how he improves throughout the year.”
Spencerville improves to 2-0 on the season and reached that mark for the first time since 2020. The Bearcats welcome the Riverside Pirates to Memorial field next Friday night.
Paulding 0 0 8 0 – 8
Spencerville 14 7 0 14- 35
Scoring recap
SV-7:16 first quarter-2 yard run Carter Layman-7-0
SV-51 seconds first quarter-70 yard run Nate Coulter-14-0
SV-6:21 second quarter-7 yard run Nate Coulter-21-0
Pa-4:59 third quarter-7 yard run Jacob Fife-21-8
SV-7:53 fourth quarter-11 yard pass from Carder Orr to Will Sensabaugh-28-8
SV-1:53 fourth quarter-40 yard pick six by Will Sensabaugh-35-8
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