The Rochester Zebras are taking a road trip to square off against the Maconaquah Braves at 7:00 p.m. on Friday. Each of these teams will be battling to keep a six-game winning streak alive.
Rochester's defense heads into the matchup hoping to repeat the dominance they displayed on Friday. They blew past Southwood, posting a 29-0 victory at home. Considering the Zebras have won seven matches by more than 27 points this season, Friday's blowout was nothing new.
Kale Shotts was his usual excellent self, rushing for 159 yards and three touchdowns on only 11 carries. The dominant performance gave him a new career-high in rushing yards. Brant Beck handled things on the ground, rushing for 105 yards and a rushing touchdown.
He was just one part of a punishing run game: Rochester was unstoppable on the ground and finished the game with 352 rushing yards. That strong performance was nothing new for the team: they've now rushed for at least 295 rushing yards in six consecutive contests.
On the defensive side of the ball, a lot of the credit has to go to Rochester's defense and their nine sacks. Leading the way was Grant Clark with four.
Meanwhile, winning is always nice, but doing so behind a season-high score is even better (just ask Maconaquah). They simply couldn't be stopped on Friday as they easily beat Wabash 77-0 at home. The Braves might be getting used to big wins seeing as the team has won seven games by 21 points or more this season.
Maconaquah's success was spearheaded by the efforts of Aiden Robinson, who threw for 376 yards and seven touchdowns while completing 78.3% of his passes, and Marcell Sims, who gained 242 total yards and three touchdowns.incredibly, Sims got all that yardage with just one huge run Aj Kelly did his part for the team as well, scoring a TD off of 74 receiving yards.
Maconaquah wouldn't let Wabash keep a hold of the ball as they managed to force three fumbles. It was truly a group effort as Auggie Higgins, Carsten Hollars, and Austin Ringeisen picked up one apiece.
Rochester's win was their eighth straight at home dating back to last season, which pushed their record up to 7-1. As for Maconaquah, their record now sits at 7-0-1.
The upcoming matchup will be a clash of competing strengths. Rochester has deployed a run-first offense that has averaged 302.9 rushing yards a game. Meanwhile, Maconaquah has preferred to attack from the air: they average 272.4 passing yards per game. So which strategy will prevail on Friday? There's only one way to find out.
Rochester took their victory against Maconaquah in their previous matchup back in October of 2023 by a conclusive 36-14. The rematch might be a little tougher for Rochester since the team won't have the home-field advantage this time around. We'll see if the change in venue makes a difference.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
