GREENWOOD – High school football players are grateful there is a season.
But you think playing Center Grove is any fun at all? It is like being treated to an amusement park, only to be nauseated for hours. Punishment is unabated.
Carmel’s Greyhounds felt it. Did they ever.
They could end up having a nice season. They did last year, closing with seven straight wins and beating Center Grove 20-17 for the Class 6A state championship.
But on Friday night? The No. 1 Trojans battered No. 6 Carmel 42-0.
You have to go back to 1999 and a 49-0 loss at Ben Davis to find a worse Carmel thumping.
“We’re just stuffing everything,” Center Grove linebacker Trey Clark said.
True, Trey.
The Metropolitan Interscholastic Conference has been around since 1996, and never had Center Grove shut out successive MIC opponents. A week ago, it was 20-0 over Warren Central. Warren Central gained all of 58 yards.
Carmel was better, but not a lot: 138 yards.
And that’s with nine plays and zero first downs in the second half. Carmel (1-2) never reached midfield in the entire game.
“We kept the field tilted on them,” Center Grove coach Eric Moore said. “We kept them pinned deep. We didn’t have too many long drives.”
The Trojans’ first-half scoring drives measured 63 and 53 yards.
It was 14-0 then, and Carmel looked as if it might halve that margin when Colton Parker made a one-handed catch along the sideline on third-and-10 for a 28-yard gain. The Greyhounds were on their own 40. Sixty yards to go against this defense? They might as well have been trying to get to Louisville.
Center Grove opened the second half with an 87-yard drive, capped by Daniel Weems’ 1-yard touchdown. It was 21-0.
Weems (19 carries for 104 yards) was one of the Trojans’ two 100-yard rushers. The other was Carson Steele, who has a little Charlie Spegal in him. Except last year Steele endured a pulled hamstring, broken foot and broken hand.
Midway through summer workouts, he said, “I just felt like it’s time. I’m back.”
ROUNDUP: Week 3 scores, statistics and highlights
Spegal, the 2019 IndyStar Mr. Football from New Palestine, and Steele are 225-pounders who are content to go through you rather than around. Steele rushed 21 times for 133 yards and three touchdowns — evidence he is returning to his 2,270-yard form of 2018.
“The physicalness of his runs are back,” Moore said. “In high school, it’s great to have guys that can run 90 yards. But man, when you punish people in 12, that takes a lot out of the defense.”
It showed. The Trojans poured it on with a 21-point fourth quarter, even though the clock kept running after it was 35-0.
Besides, the defense kept returning the ball to the offense. Clark had four solo tackles and two assists, and Carmel had to double-team Center Grove tackle Caden Curry, the top-rated Indiana prospect in the 2022 class.
“Everyone knows what they say. Defense wins games first,” Steele said. “They’re definitely No. 1 in the state. Love those guys.”
Don’t think you can load the box against Center Grove, either. Tayven Jackson, another hot 2022 prospect, was an efficient 9-of-15 passing for 86 yards and a touchdown. Moore asks his quarterback to run “a clean game,” and Jackson was cleaner than a hand sanitizer.
“It’s hard to be a kid right now and play high school football, not knowing what’s going to happen,” Moore said. “I’ve just got to give credit to my coaches and our families and our parents and our kids, staying focused and getting the job done.”
Moore, in his 22nd season, will try for his 200th victory at Center Grove in next week’s trip to Ben Davis. Looking farther ahead, Center Grove (3-0) will face 6A No. 3 Lawrence North and 5A No. 1 Cathedral in weeks 8 and 9. The latter have scored a collective 312 points in six games, or 52 per game.
You could object that October is too far ahead to look during a pandemic season, but Center Grove was preparing to play even later into the calendar.
“We were ready if it was going to be in the fall or if it was in the spring,” Clark said. “No matter what, we were going to be ready.”
Contact IndyStar reporter David Woods at david.woods@indystar.com. Follow him on Twitter: @DavidWoods007.
Center Grove 42, Carmel 0
Carmel 0 0 0 0 -- 0
Center Grove 7 7 7 21 – 42
CG – Garrett Keith 4 pass from Tayven Jackson (Austin Watson kick)
CG – Carson Steele 1 run (Watson kick)
CG – Daniel Weems 1 run (Watson kick)
CG – Steele 9 run (Watson kick)
CG – Steele 3 run (Watson kick)
CG – Drew Wheat 30 run (Watson kick)
Rushing – Carmel: Zach White 8-62, Colton Parker 2-9, Zach Osborne 5-3, Jordan Jones 1-(-3). CG: Steele 21-133, Weems 19-104, Wheat 4-55, Jackson 4-25, Eli Hohlt 2-3.
Passing – Carmel: Zach Osborne 8-17-0 67, Parker 0-3-0 0. CG: Jackson 9-15-0 86.
Receiving – Carmel: Parker 3-34, White 3-23, Jaedon King 1-8, Baron Smith 1-2. CG: Connor Delp 5-44, Trent Veith 1-16, Steele 1-14, Mason Long 1-8, Keith 1-4.
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