On their opening possession, the guests held the ball for more than eight minutes, ran 20 plays, scored three times and came away with zero points. A pair of holding penalties and an offensive pass interference call nullified three TDs, including an 80-yard run by sophomore Ki’on Carson.
The Hearts had the ball for less than eight minutes the entire first half, but scored on all three of their possessions.
Their first drive was their most impressive of the game. The Hearts marched 97 yards in 14 plays. A key third down, 15-yard pass from Tanner Pontious to Armando Estrada moved the ball away from their goal line and provided some operating room.
Another big play came on a 4th-and-2 when John Westendorf bolted for eight yards and another first down. Then on the final play of the drive, Pontious found Evan Waymoth open in the flat. The junior fullback hauled in the short pass and covered the final 25 yards for the score that put the hosts on top 7-0 at the 9:16 mark of the second period.
For one of the few times in the game, the EHS defense forced a three-and-out and the Lincoln punt went only 14 yards, setting up the Hearts at the visitor’s 36-yard line. After a procedure penalty of the Hearts, it took just two plays to find the end zone again when Pontious found Estrada behind the Lincoln secondary for a 41-yard scoring strike.
The Railsplitters got their first score of the game on the ensuing possession. They went 80 yards in 16 plays. Quarterback Elijah Pollice collected his first of two TD passes on a 33-yard strike to Jaden Leadley. The two-point conversion trimmed the EHS lead to 14-8 with just 1:03 left in the opening half.
But the Hearts struck back quickly. They managed to run six plays in just 36 seconds. The big one was a 52-yard completion to Estrada that moved the ball inside the Lincoln 10. With just 21 seconds left, Pontious covered the final six yards on the ground to send the Hearts to the locker room with a 21-8 advantage.
“Offensively, we did some good things in the first half, especially in the second period,” Hefner noted. “We made some plays. And we had a chance to come out in the second half and keep it going. But that didn’t happen.”
Effingham’s first two possessions in the third period resulted in just three plays and a punt. After the second punt, the Railers got within one score again. They covered 62 yards in five plays. Pollice completed two passes for 32 yards and then ran it in from four yards out to narrow the gap to 21-15.
The Hearts responded by putting together their only real drive of the second half. The seven-play possesion was aided by a pass interference penalty against Lincoln. Westendorf was the workhorse, carrying the ball on six of the seven plays; the final one being a 22-yard gallop to extend the lead to 28-15 with 10:03 left in the game.
Effingham capped its scoring six minutes later. Lincoln went for a fourth down, failed to convert and gave the Hearts possession just 13 yards away from the goal line. Five plays later, Keegan Baker broke loose for a four-yard run that made it 34-15.
Lincoln scored again with only 24 seconds to play after Anthony Gandolfi turned a screen pass into a 61-yard gain and Pontious then connected with Carson on a 15-yard scoring pass to account for the final score.
The Railsplitters, who run a Wing-T formation on offense, were hard to stop for most of the game. Pollice finished 20-for-36 through the air for 345 yards. Isaac Decker hauled in eight passes for 101 yards, while Carson had another five receptions for 93 more. After gaining 65 yards on the ground in the first 12 minutes, Lincoln rushed for just 40 more over the final three quarters.
“Lincoln has improved a lot,” Hefner said. “That Wing-T is unconventional and it’s hard to simulate their speed in practice. But we were doing things tonight like we did the first four weeks of the season and they weren’t good. We made a lot of mistakes and did things that just are not conducive to winning games.”
The Hearts finished with 276 total yards – 143 on the ground and 133 in the air. Pontious was 4-for-5 in the first half, but didn’t complete any of his five passes in the final two quarters. Westendorf led the ground attack with 89 yards on 16 carries. Estrada finished with three catches for 108 yards.
With the win, the Hearts improved to 4-3 overall and finished conference play with a 3-2 mark. They will face tough opponents their final two weeks, traveling to Breese Mater Die next Friday and finishing at home the following week against Highland.
“We’ll take a look at the film from tonight’s game,” Hefner said. “I know there’s going to be a lot to fix. We better come ready to play the next two weeks. We’ll be in a world hurt if we play like we did tonight.”
