Football Preview: Cousino Patriots vs. Utica Chieftains
The Cousino Patriots will head out on the road to take on the Utica Chieftains at 7:00 p.m. on Friday. Cousino is strutting in with some offensive muscle as they've averaged 29 points per game this season.
Cousino is headed into the matchup after thoroughly thrashing Lake Shore: they outscored them in every quarter. Given that consistent dominance, it should come as no surprise that Cousino blew Lake Shore out of the water with a 54-6 final score. The Patriots pushed the score to 48-6 by the end of the third, a deficit the Shorians had no chance of recovering from.
Cousino can attribute much of their success to Brick Sandridge, who threw for 137 yards and four touchdowns on only 11 passes, and Daniel Carter, who gained 160 total yards and a touchdown. Carter's longest rush was for an impressive 52 yards, which helps to explain his lofty yards per carry total. Kameran Hayward was in the mix too, providing Cousino with two touchdowns.
Perhaps unsurprisingly given the score, Cousino was unstoppable on the ground and finished the game with 293 rushing yards. That's a new trend for them: they were averaging 92.6 rushing yards per game earlier this season, but in their last three contests they've averaged 227.
Cousino didn't go easy on the quarterback and picked off two passes before the game was over. The picks came courtesy of Hayward and Jake Rudd.
Meanwhile, Utica fell victim to Dakota and their airtight defense on Friday. They had to suffer through a 35-0 loss at the hands of the Cougars. While losing is never fun, the Chieftains can't take it too hard given the team's big disadvantage in MaxPreps' Michigan football rankings (they are ranked 146th, while the Cougars are ranked ninth).
Cousino has been performing well recently as they've won three of their last four matches, which provided a nice bump to their 5-3 record this season. As for Utica, their defeat dropped their record down to 3-5.
Cousino suffered a grim 35-15 defeat to Utica in their previous meeting back in September of 2017. Thankfully for Cousino, Christian Gegovic (who rushed for 86 yards and two touchdowns on only eight carries) won't be suiting up this time. Will that be enough to change the final result? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
