Excessive offensive penalties for Chesterton a factor in Michigan City pulling away in second half to win DAC opener 30-13

Tom Keegan
Onwardtrojans.com

Michigan City lost a fumble on its third play from scrimmage, threw an interception on its fourth play, got stopped on fourth down two yards shy of the goal line and still managed to enter the locker room tied at halftime on the way to a 30-13 victory over visiting Chesterton on Friday night at Ames Field.
The Wolves (2-1 overall, 1-0 in the DAC) capitalized on their opponent’s mistakes well enough to overcome their own, and came out on fire breaking from a 7-7 deadlock at the half, scored the first 23 points of the second half and generally looked like the more talented team than the Trojans (1-2, 0-1).
Chesterton’s strategy of handing the ball to Andrew Goveia and watching him eat yardage and clock that worked so well in the previous week’s 20-19 win over Hammond Morton, wasn’t an option for much of the night because the Trojans gave themselves so many bad down-and-distance situations from pre-snap penalties.
“We have to be methodical on offense and we took ourselves out of that with first-and 15 and second and long,” Chesterton head coach Mark Peterson said.
Senior center Carlos Leon’s absence was felt both in terms of communication errors that led to some of those penalties and blocking to blow open holes for Goveia and to help with protection for sophomore quarterback Hunter Boyd, under duress all night from City’s relentless rush.
Even so, Boyd’s third game was his best. He completed 12 of 22 passes for 154 yards and two touchdowns and was sacked five times for 27 yards in losses). All the receptions came from seniors: Louis Raffin (five, 60 yards, one TD, drew a pass interference penalty), Patrick Mochen (four, , 65 yards, one TD) and Mike Rone (three, 29 yards).
The Trojans had no shortage of big plays in a first quarter that ended with them leading, 7-0.
Caden Koedyker recovered a fumble on Michigan City’s third play and Lucas Anderson intercepted a pass on City’s fourth play, enabling the Trojans to take over at midfield.
Nine plays later, Boyd and senior receiver Louis Raffin connected on a 30-yard touchdown strike on third-and-14. Boyd lofted a beautiful spiral that appeared as though it might be just a little bit too long. But Raffin turned the burners on, lunged forward, extended his arms as far as they could go and caught it with his fingertips in the end zone.
“That’s what we’ve been talking about in practice on those balls,” Raffin said. “He gets it up there, so I have a chance to get under it, use my speed. I saw it was a little far, so I sprinted as fast as I could and reached for it.”
When Raffin was asked if he almost fell, reaching for it, he laughed and said, “Yeah.”
Anderson made sure the score stayed 7-0 when he made his second big play of the half, making the stop on the Wolves’ fourth-and-1 run from the 2.


After a three-and-out from the Chesterton offebnse and a punt on which Chesterton was assessed a 15-yard penalty, City took over at the 24. Quarterback Trinaston Hart ran it in from the 1 to cap a nine-play drive, the biggest a 16-yard completion from Hart to Jeremy Thurman on fourth-and-9 to tie it.
In the second half, the Wolves scored on their opening drive and threatened on their next possession until Logan Chestovich intercepted a pass near the goal line. Chesterton’s punt on fourth-and-6 from the 6 was blocked and squirted out of the back of the end zone for a safety and the Trojans’ deficit grew to 16-7, soon to be 23-17 on a long drive aided by a 15-yard Chesterton personal foul penalty. Another long City drive made the lead 30-7.
From there, a few Trojans already having good nights made big plays to cut into the lead, however slightly and late.
In a four-play span, junior Zane Westerlund’s strong season grew stronger when the big, athletic linebacker threw Hart for an 8-yard loss and then blocked a punt.
Chesterton took over on City’s 37 and Boyd, whose list of assets does not include speed, showed elusiveness on multiple plays and completed 4 of 5 passes for 37 yards, the final pass an 8-yard touchdown to Patrick Mochen in the end zone. Cousins Mochen and Raffin each had two receptions on the quick scoring drive.
On the TD pass to Mochen, evaded not one tackler who would have dropped him for a loss but two, all the while keeping his eyes forward.
“That’s something he’ll slowly get better at,” Mochen said of Boyd evading the pressure. “We didn’t see too much of that the first couple of games, and we saw a bit of that this game. I think we’ll continue to see that.”
Boyd and the rest of the first-year varsity players will learn from the game as coaches review the film with them, take it to the field and show them what to do how and when and when not to do it. Teammates will share their knowledge as well.
The younger players can learn more than football from senior leaders Mochen and Raffin. They can learn from the accountability each showed being interviewed after the game.
“In the run game, a lot of that was on me,” Mochen said. “I did not play very well in the run game when I was at fullback. I didn’t not give Gove the right block. Passing-wise, Hunter did a good job, but there are things everybody could do better. Pre-snap, we made errors and post-snap we just didn’t block right.”
Discussing the excessive pre-snap penalties, Mochen said, “Sometimes we didn’t make the right call. Some people didn’t hear the call, too many men in the backfield. That’s something that with newer guys, that’ll happen. Last year, my first couple of games, I made those mistakes. Their first year on varsity, that’ll happen, but by the end of the year we expect them to take care of that and these guys are good enough to do that.”
Mochen started with what he did wrong, let younger players know they didn’t make any mistakes he hadn’t made at that stage of his career, and let them know he believes in their ability to do better and set an expectation for them. Leadership 101.
Late in the first half, Raffin slipped behind the defense, like how he did on the touchdown, but Boyd overthrew him by a good bit. Raffin was quick to share that Boyd was not to blame.
“We weren’t on the same page on how I ran that route,” Raffin said. “That was actually my fault.”
Again, sharing that was right out of the Leadership 101 playbook.
“Hunter’s doing really well for a young guy, really well,” Raffin said. “He’s also starting to pick up on leadership, that’s one thing I’ve noticed. He’s being louder, getting the team going, taking charge of the huddle.”
Peterson also sounded a positive note on his long, lean, lefty quarterback’s development.
“He’s starting to come into his own, starting to feel more comfortable. Overall, he’s doing a good job. We just have to protect a little better for him,” Peterson said. “We can’t rely on him as sophomore to throw the ball 35 times a game. That’s not our forte right now and that’s unfair to him to try to expect that from him, so we have to do a little better job in the run game, controlling it better.”
The next chance to do that will come when the Trojans’ offensive line might be fully healthy. Braxton Ozug had the wind knocked out of him late, but is expected to return and Leon might be bck.
Chesterton is at home Friday night against LaPorte (1-2, 0-1), which is coming off a 28-0 loss to Valparaiso.