On Friday night, the Mississinewa Indians put together another dominant performance in a 60-0 blowout win over the Elwood Panthers. With the win, the Indians improved to 3-1 on the season.
Quarterback Cade McCoin had his best game of the season so far, finishing 13-of-17 for 283 yards and four touchdowns. Heisman Skeens caught all four of McCoin’s touchdown passes, and finished the game with eight catches for 203 yards.
“I think one thing was that we were able to get our passing game going,” Head Coach Curt Funk said. “McCoin did a nice job of finding the open receivers, and our receivers did a nice job of getting open.”
Mississinewa’s run game was also stellar, as the Indians racked up 320 yards on 26 carries. Sophomore Evan Bellus led the charge with 15 carries for 196 yards and two touchdowns, while Cade Campbell also scored two touchdowns on 89 yards rushing.
Known for being more of a run-heavy team, Mississinewa threw the ball more against Elwood then they have in recent weeks. After studying Elwood’s defense, Funk felt that running more pass plays would help Mississinewa’s offense to get into a groove.
“Week by week, we like to have balance, but we are going to take what the defense gives us,” Funk said. “We felt that passing the ball against Elwood was going to give us more of an offensive advantage, so that was our gameplan going in.”
After a tough loss to New Haven two weeks ago, the Indians’ defense has kicked it into high gear, giving up just three points in the last eight quarters of football.
This coming Friday, the Indians face one of their toughest challenges of the season, as they will to travel to Eastbrook to take on the 4-0 Panthers. Mississinewa was the only team that beat Eastbrook last season as the Panthers ultimately advanced to the state finals. If the Indians want to do it again, Funk knows that team has to be fundamentally sound in all facets of the game.
“It really comes down to the basics of football,” Funk said. “We are going to have to do a tremendous job blocking and then our tacking is going to have to be spot on. [Along with that,] we can’t have any mistakes on special teams. To win tough games like this, we have to be great the basics of football.”
