Mighty Maples: Mapletown romps over Mikes, improves to 5-0
Mapletown鈥檚 Landan Stevenson (1) wards off a Carmichaels defender during Friday night鈥檚 game at Mapletown. Stevenson ran for 140 yards and three touchdowns in the Maples鈥� 42-0 victory. (Photo by Rob Burchianti)
Mapletown鈥檚 Brock Evans (32) signals its the Maples ball as Levi Howard (58) celebrates after recovering a Carmichaels fumble during Friday night鈥檚 game at Mapletown. (Photo by Rob Burchianti)
Mapletown's Brody Evans (22) breaks up a pass intended for Carmichaels' Cannon Bupka (2) during Friday night's game at Mapletown.
Rob Burchianti | 缅北禁地
Mapletown鈥檚 A.J. Vanata dives into the end zone for a touchdown in the first quarter of Friday night鈥檚 game against Carmichaels at Mapletown.
Rob Burchianti | 缅北禁地
Mapletown鈥檚 Cohen Stout (79) tackles Carmichels鈥� Ambrose Anderson during Friday night鈥檚 game at Mapletown. Stout made 12 tackles in the Maples鈥� 42-0 win.
GREENSBORO 鈥� It was the Landan Stevenson Show again last Friday night as Mapletown handily defeated Carmichaels 42-0 to remain undefeated in the Class A Tri-County South Conference.
Stevenson, doing double-duty as the primary running back and placekicker, along with teammate A.J. Vanata, led a bruising rushing attack that totaled 240 yards on the ground and five rushing touchdowns.
鈥淥ur plan on offense was to run the football and mix a few passing plays in with it,鈥� Mapletown coach George Messich said. 鈥淎nd defensively, our kids are just real aggressive. We didn鈥檛 change anything. We played defense tonight the way we did the last four games.鈥�
Stevenson did it all for Mapletown (2-0, 5-0), which entered the game 4-0 for the first time since 1997.
On 21 carries, Stevenson rushed for 140 yards and three touchdowns. He also went seven-for-seven on extra-point kicks, caught a pass from Vanata for 27 yards and completed a pass to Vanata for eight yards.
Vanata had nine carries for 64 yards and two rushing touchdowns, covering nine and 12 yards.
鈥�(Vanata and Stevenson) are both very good runners,鈥� Messich said. 鈥淎nd they鈥檒l be the first to tell you though, our offensive line is a lot better than we鈥檝e had in a long time. We have four or five guys up there who do a tremendous job blocking.鈥�
鈥淚 expected them to run the ball and they did,鈥� Carmichaels coach Ron Gallagher said. 鈥淭hey did it efficiently. You know, we were losing every phase of this game. Nothing was really going our way.鈥�
Vanata scored first for Mapletown on an nine-yard run with 7:25 in the first to go up 7-0 with Stevenson adding the extra-point kick.
Mapletown followed with three touchdowns in the second quarter: a six-yard rushing TD by Stevenson, a nine-yard scoring jaunt by Stevenson, and a 15-yard passing touchdown from Brody Evans to Evan Griffin to put Mapletown up 28-0 at halftime.
鈥淲e don鈥檛 ever give a message of being down,鈥� Gallagher said. 鈥淚 said, 鈥楲isten, if they can score 28, so can we.'鈥�
Carmichaels鈥� defense did do better in the second half, but Mapletown still found ways to score. Vanata had a 12-yard touchdown run in the third quarter, and Stevenson had a 10-yard touchdown run in the fourth.
Stevenson finished with 24 points giving him 521 for his career, which breaks the Mapletown school record of 516 that was held by Dylan Rush.
鈥淲e鈥檝e got to look at the film and see what鈥檚 going on and get back to fundamental football,鈥� Gallagher said. 鈥淏ecause we didn鈥檛 play really good fundamentally.鈥�
The Mikes will look to bounce back in their next game at Beth-Center. Mapletown has another key TCS game at California.