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Steubenville game story:


The Big Red of Steubenville High School ventured into the Ohio High School football playoffs for the 22nd time in their storied football history and for the 17th time they came away with an opening round victory. Big Red opened the 2009 playoffs with a 34-26 win over the Dukes of Alliance Marlington. Steubenville, who finished atop the Region 11 computer ratings, improves to 10-1 on the season while Marlington will close the books on 2009 with an 8-3 record.

Despite the closeness of the final score, Big Red was in command throughout the game as they raced out to a big first half advantage and held off a late Marlington surge to secure the win.

After holding the Dukes to a 3 and out to start the game, the Big Red took over at the 50 and used 9 plays to score first in the game on a 5 yard run by quarterback Dwight Macon. Anthony Pierro’s PAT made the score 7-0 with 7:06 to go in the first. Again Marlington could run only 3 plays before punting the ball back to Steubenville and again it took the Big Red 9 plays, covering 76 yards, to extend their lead. Fullback Leshawn Luke dove over from the 1 yard line to give Steubenville a 13-0 advantage with a minute left in the opening quarter.

Marlington, having no success on offense against the Big Red defense again punted the ball back to the Big Red after running just 4 plays and Steubenville started from their 37. The Big Red would continue mixing the run and pass as they took 11 plays and 5 ½ minutes to score on their 3rd straight possession with Macon again scoring on a 5 yard run. With 5:05 to go in the second quarter the Big Red was on top 20-0.

After trading possessions the Dukes offense showed their first sign of life as they were able to score with 1:54 before the half to close the gap to 20-6. Steubenville would take the ensuing kickoff and run 13 plays, getting deep into Marlington territory before an interception in the end zone on the last play of half halted the threat. Big Red had out gained the Dukes 261-59 in the first half controlling over 15 minutes of the clock.

Following a 35 yard kickoff return by Alvin Taylor, the Big Red started the second half at the Dukes 39. Nine plays later Luke would get his second touchdown of the night on a 2 yard, run moving Big Red’s lead to 27-7 early in the 3rd quarter. Marlington would answer the Big Red score with one of their own trimming the Big Red lead to 27-12.

The two teams would then trade punts and Steubenville would put the game away early in the last stanza when Dwight Macon hit a wide open Trey Wiggins on a 61 yard scoring strike culminating a 4 play 74 yard drive with just under 11 minutes to go in the final quarter to take a 34-12 lead. The Dukes would then score twice against the Big Red reserves closing the gap to 34-26 with just over a minute to play but their onside kick attempt failed and Steubenville was able to run out the clock and advance to week 2 of the playoffs.

The Big Red finished the game with 399 yards of total offense. The Big Red ran 75 plays compared to Marlington’s 37. Senior Quarterback Dwight Macon had one of his best games of the season completing 20 of 31 passes for 230 yards and a touchdown. Macon has now thrown for 1,218 yards for the season with 14 touchdowns and just 2 interceptions.

Team leading receiver Trey Wiggins had 5 catches for 123 yards and a score and Junior Anthony Pierro had 9 receptions for 61 yards. On the ground Sophomore Jo Jo Pierro led the attack as he accounted for 88 of Big Red’s 169 yards on the ground. Macon added 41 yards of rushing to go with his passing. The Big Red offense held the ball for over 29 minutes. Anthony Pierro made 4 of 5 PATs and punted twice in the game for a 46.0 yard average per punt.

It was a total team effort by the Big Red defense as held the Dukes in check until late in the game when they scored their 2 meaningless touchdowns. Leading the way was Sophomore Leshawn Luke who totaled 8 tackles in the game. Junior Linebacker and team leading tackler Shaq Petteway added 6 stops including 3 for losses while Senior Defensive end John Elder also had 6 tackles. Junior Jordan Meyer and Senior Jordan Banks each chipped in with 5 tackles. Seven of Marlington’s 37 plays went for negative yardage including Big Red’s 17th sack of the season. Four of Marlington’s 10 possessions ended in 3 and outs.

Steubenville will now move on to week 2 of playoffs as they will face the Salem Quakers in the regional Semi-Finals. Salem, who is making their first ever appearance in the Ohio post season advanced with a 38-31 overtime victory over Granville at Granville.