Out of hand: Rochester pulls away from Glenwood after close first half
ROCHESTER — As if the end of the first half wasn’t bad enough for Chatham Glenwood, the team was left to stand by a fence behind an end zone through halftime, uncovered, as sheets of rain came down at Rocket Booster Stadium Friday night. Meanwhile, the hometown Rochester Rockets, fresh off a last-minute touchdown and a 15-minute siesta in comfy school locker-room surroundings, returned to the field dry and refreshed.
When a Glenwood player fielded the second-half kickoff, he immediately slipped and went down. On the Titans’ second play from scrimmage, Rochester intercepted a pass from quarterback Colten Knoedler. And that pretty much sums up what it was like for the visiting Titans from that final minute of the first half through the rest of the game.
Rochester won the game, 63-21, to stay unbeaten at 8-0 overall (7-0 in the Central State Eight Conference). What should have been a 21-14 game at halftime, with Glenwood getting the ball to start the second half, was 28-14 instead and a total blowout not long into the third quarter.
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“With the rain coming, I thought, ‘Man we’re in trouble,’” Rochester coach Derek Leonard said. “But after that, we kicked into gear. Give them credit though; they played us hard like they always do. But when we made mistakes, we responded.”
Nolan Mrozowski runs wild
Senior running back Nolan Mrozowski was the star for the Rockets, as he scored five touchdowns, including a 23-yard dash to open the scoring in the first quarter. Mrozowski had 10 touchdowns coming into the game.
“He’s a hard runner, had a great game, a breakout kind of game I’d say,” Leonard said.
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In the end, Rochester had too much in the way of big-play capability while Glenwood (5-3, 4-3 in CS8) had to work too hard to get points on the board.
But it’s not like the Titans didn’t have their chances. The final minute of the first half will haunt their memories. Things were looking up for Glenwood when senior linebacker Theo Blackston intercepted Rochester QB Bryan Zulauf at the Rochester 15-yard line, with 1 minute, 31 seconds left in the half. Gavin Simmons caught a 14-yard TD pass with 46.5 seconds left, and suddenly it was a 21-14 football game. Knoedler had a nice first half, too, completing nine of 13 passes for 143 yards.
But that’s when everything — everything — went Rochester’s way.
The Titans’ tackling abilities disappeared on them, and Zulauf completed a crazy, lefty fling pass as he was about to be sacked for a big Rockets’ gain. Mrozowski went into the end zone from two yards out to put Rochester up 28-14. Glenwood simply couldn’t recover from that.
No excuses for Glenwood
Still, Glenwood coach David Hay said he thought his team was “ready to respond” to start the second half. But it didn’t happen.
“The rain definitely was a factor in the game,” Hay said, “(but) for both teams. I’m not into excuses.”
Mrozowski scored his third TD of the night with an 8-yard dash after a Rockets’ interception to make it 35-14. From there, Rochester’s defense could just pin their ears back and rush in on Knoedler. It was 63-14 when sophomore Grady Mueller salvaged some Titans’ pride with a 90-yard TD kickoff return.
Rochester’s two-way senior tight end/defensive lineman Lance Ingold, who will play football next year for Northern Illinois University, said only one thing is on the Rockets’ minds: A return to state championship glory.
“I think we’re focused,” Ingold said. “This year, we want it bad. We haven’t gotten one in four years, so we’ve just got to get one this year.”
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Rockets senior wide receiver A.J. Bales concurred.
“Being the only senior group that doesn’t have a ring in the last few years, we want to get one pretty bad,” Bales said.
Adrian Dater is a freelance writer for The State Journal-Register. He can be reached through the sports department at sports@sj-r.com.
This article originally appeared on State Journal-Register: IHSA football: Rochester opens up big lead on Glenwood to stay perfect
