Merrillville junior running back Cameron Jordan rushes for two of his three touchdowns and 227 yards in first half alone in Pirates’ 42-7 trouncing of visiting Chesterton

Tom Keegan
Onwardtrojans.com

It’s not often that every player and every coach can say with conviction that they want to face again soon a running back who led his team to a 42-7 win over them by rushing for three touchdowns and an unofficial tally of 253 yards on eight carries.
But in the case of Chesterton, all Trojans honestly do want to face Merrillville junior Cameron Jordan again Nov. 14, four weeks after he had a relatively light workload and turned it into a sensational highlight film Friday night.
Because facing Jordan again would mean that the Trojans won their first sectional in school history to advance to a rematch with Merrillville in the regional round of the state tournament, assuming the Pirates win Section 9, in which they will be heavy favorites.
Three carries into his night, Jordan already had rushed for 181 yards, and that was before his first of three touchdowns in front of the home crowd.
By halftime, Jordan had carried the ball six times, gained 227 yards, and made it to the end zone on runs of 22 and 9 yards. He ran for another 22-yard touchdown in the second half.
Jordan gave a beautiful performance on a night where the game often was as sloppy as the weather was pleasant.
Speaking loudly enough for the whole stadium to hear him but in a tone that had not the least bit of anger and at the same time was not coated with sugar, Merrillville coach matter-of-factly imparted to his players that the Pirates “sloppy” performance did not hurt them Friday night but will in the playoffs if repeated. Excessive flags, most for illegal blocks, were thrown against the Pirates, also penalized for unsportsmanlike conduct.
Even at full strength and playing a clean game, Chesterton would have a difficult time hanging with the much faster Pirates, and the Trojans were weakened by injuries and hurt themselves with miscues on offense, defense and special teams. A telegraphed pass turned into a pick six here, a fumble there, missed tackles here, there and everywhere all left Chesterton coach Mark Peterson frankly assessing his team’s play.
“There is no excuse for some of the things we didn’t accomplish or perform well enough tonight,” Peterson said. “We have some guys out. I understand that. But we’re at that point in the season where other guys have to start stepping up.”
Running back Andrew Goveia and offensive tackle Tyler Nevious were among those sidelined. The defensive line wasn’t at full strength either, but Peterson didn’t use those facts as crutches.
“We have to be more efficient and some of those young guys really aren’t young guys anymore because they’ve had the entire season to grow and develop,” he said. “This isn’t Week 2 or Week 3 anymore, so we have to have a higher level of expectation.”
Merrillville wasted no time in putting the visitors in retreat.
The first play was a 5-yard penalty against the Pirates, and on the next, Jordan broke free for a 65-yard run. If Peyton Dilbeck, the fastest player on Chesterton’s defense, had not stopped him at the 20 via the only way he could, with a horse-collar tackle, an illegal play that advanced the ball half the distance to the goal to the 10, it would have been an 85-yard touchdown run. Instead, the 6-yard gain set up the night’s first score. Overcoming another penalty, the Pirates went up 7-0 at 10:38 of the first quarter on a Michael Hill 13-yard pass to Mikel Smoot.
Back from injury and filling in for Goveia, junior Max Soffin slithered his way to a 26-yard gain on Chesterton’s second play from scrimmage, for what would be the second-longest gain of the night for the Trojans. Four plays later, Chesterton punted, then got the ball back on downs, but only for one play.
The hosts went up 14-0 when Rynell Lewis intercepted Hunter Boyd’s short pass and returned it for a touchdown with 5:21 left in the first quarter.
Chesterton showed signs of life, again getting the ball back on downs. After a 10-yard Boyd-to-Louis Raffin pass, Boyd again completed a short pass to Raffin, who juked his defender and used his speed to race along the right sideline for a 62-yard touchdown reception, his fourth of the season.
Merrillville punted after a three-and-out, but any thoughts of a gathering momentum shift perished when Soffin fumbled at the end of a 6-yard run and Jordan extended the Pirates’ lead to 21-7 with a 22-yard TD run, a lead that swelled to 28-7 on Jordan’s 9-yard TD run with 2:49 left in the half.
“They came out and kind of punched us in the mouth early and we didn’t respond. That’s not a good sign,” Peterson said. “We have to be able to take on that pressure offensively and defensively better than we did tonight.”
Jordan’s 22-yard third-quarter TD and Jac’Quarious Johnson’s 11-yard TD rush in the fourth quarter accounted for the final points. Jordan scored four touchdowns in last season's 29-23 win over Chesterton, so he has seven touchdowns in two games vs. the Trojans.
Chesterton has a bye week before opening the postseason with a sectional semifinal at home vs. LaPorte on Halloween night.
The Trojans had the appearance of a team that could use a reset for a variety of reasons, including health-related but not limited to that.
“We’ll use these two weeks to hopefully get some good, solid practices and get some people healthy and back in the mix and get ready for LaPorte,” Peterson said.
If the Trojans get past the Slicers, they will play the winner of Michigan City at Valparaiso. A sectional final vs. Valpo would be in Chesterton, and one vs. City would put the Trojans on the road.
Chesterton (5-4, 4-3) finished fourth in the DAC, behind Crown Point (7-0), Merrillville (6-1) and City (5-2). LaPorte, Lake Central and Valpo tied for fifth with 2-5 records and Portage went 0-7.