Two dominant signal callers in Caiden Kernaghan and Ryne Sheppard are getting ready to go toe-to-toe. The St. Teresa Bulldogs are taking a road trip to challenge the Maroa-Forsyth Trojans at 1:00 p.m. on Saturday. St. Teresa is strutting in with some offensive muscle as they've averaged 28.4 points per game this season.
St. Teresa is probably headed into the contest with a chip on their shoulder considering Highland just ended the team's four-game winning streak on Friday. They had to suffer through a 55-7 loss at the hands of the Bulldogs. While losing is never fun, St. Teresa can't take it too hard given the team's big disadvantage in MaxPreps' Illinois football rankings (they are ranked 299th, while Highland is ranked 95th).
Meanwhile, there's no place like home for Maroa-Forsyth, who bounced back after a loss on the road two weeks ago. Everything went their way against New Berlin/Franklin/Waverly on Friday as Maroa-Forsyth made off with a 43-22 victory. The result was nothing new for the Trojans, who have now won eight matchups by 21 points or more so far this season.
Sheppard continued his habit of posting crazy stat lines, throwing for 217 yards and three touchdowns while completing 80% of his passes, and also rushing for 43 yards. He has been hot recently, having posted three or more passing touchdowns the last three times he's played. 114 of Sheppard's passing yards were hauled in by Zach Smith, who also brought in a receiving touchdown.
St. Teresa's loss dropped their record down to 5-4. As for Maroa-Forsyth, they pushed their record up to 8-1 with the win, which was their ninth straight at home dating back to last season.
The upcoming game will be a clash of competing strengths. St. Teresa has deployed a run-first offense that has averaged 227.7 rushing yards a game. Meanwhile, Maroa-Forsyth has preferred to attack from the air: they average 291.9 passing yards per game. So which strategy will prevail on Saturday? There's only one way to find out.
St. Teresa couldn't quite finish off Maroa-Forsyth when the teams last played back in November of 2018 and fell 16-14. Can St. Teresa avenge their defeat or is history doomed to repeat itself? We'll find out soon enough.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
