Crabbs reaches 2,000 yards in St. Paul rout

Oct. 29—NORWALK — Elite company.

It was another workmanlike performance on Friday for St. Paul senior running back Quincey Crabbs.

On a night the Flyers totaled 396 yards and eight touchdowns on the ground, the All-Ohio running back put himself on a short list. Crabbs ran 20 times for 223 yards and 4 TDs as St. Paul (8-3) blasted visiting Lisbon David Anderson (5-6) by a 64-20 win in a Division VII Region 25 first-round playoff game.

With the win at Contractors Stadium, the Flyers improved to 8-3 overall. As the No. 5 seed in the region, they will travel 2.5 hours to No. 4 Salineville Southern (10-1) next Friday in a second round matchup.

With Crabbs rushing for 223 yards on 20 carries, he unofficially has 2,013 yards this season. He joins Dan Pugh (1997, 2,368), Jason Pugh (1999, 2,008) and Brad Smith (2014, 2,006) as the only players in program history to reach the milestone yardage.

Crabbs also did it in 11 games, becoming the fastest of the four to reach the mark, besting Dan Pugh first clearing 2,000 yards in his 13th of 14 games in 1997.

"I think it's great for Quincey, who is a talented, hard-working kid," St. Paul head coach John Livengood said. "Something like that though, it's a great team accomplishment. Quincey would be the first to tell you he gets some great blocking from our line, our receivers and our backs to get going.

"But once he gets going, he's special. Just a tough runner who is a great combination of speed and power. Those are some pretty big names he's with now."

Friday's game was never in question. St. Paul got a 1-yard run by Jack Stieber and a 2-yard run by Crabbs to cap quick drives of 52 and 43 yards, giving it a 13-0 lead at the 6:37 mark of the first quarter.

The two drives took just 10 plays and lasted 4:40 in game clock.

After Anderson got a 31-yard TD pass on a third-and-10 from Trevor Siefke to Austin Daley to cut into the deficit at 13-7, the Flyers answered in a matter of seconds.

Senior AJ Meyer returned the ensuing kickoff 72 yards for the score, and 11 seconds later, the Flyers were ahead 19-7.

Crabbs then intercepted a pass on defense at the Anderson 24 on the very next play from scrimmage.

Two plays later Drew Kuhnle scored on an 11-yard QB keeper, then Crabbs ran in the 2-point conversion to give the Flyers a 27-7 lead — and less than eight minutes had passed in the opening quarter.

"We were able to get field position with our special teams, and we got some stops early," Livengood said. "The keys was getting some stops to create some separation, and we were able to do that enough in the first half. Things kind of went from there."

Anderson scored on a 13-play, 68-yard drive that pulled it within 27-14, but the Flyers came back with two more TDs.

Crabbs went in from a yard to finish a 53-yard drive, then junior Ben Burger — who also unofficially has 1,305 yards this season — scored on a 34-yard run out of the Wildcat formation. That put the Flyers up 41-14 with 4:01 left in the half.

The Blue Devils scored once more with just 16 seconds left in the half, as Siefke connected with Logan Stauffer on a 5-yard TD pass to make it a 41-20 game.

But it was all St. Paul from there.

After a Xavier Smith interception gave the Flyers the ball at the Anderson 46 early in the third quarter, Crabbs scored three plays later from the 12. He added the two-point run for a 49-20 lead at the 9:39 mark of the third.

After a turnover on downs by the Devils at the St. Paul 19, the Flyers went 81 yards in six plays with Crabbs scoring from the 18.

Once Burger scored the 2-point run, it was a 57-20 lead with 3:49 left in the third.

The Flyers closed out the scoring with mostly backups in the game — six plays after Crabbs safely eclipsed 2,000 yards in his final home game.

Stieber scored on a 7-yard run with 3:52 left to finish off the win.

Burger added 139 yards on 10 attempts and a score for the Flyers. Kuhnle attempted just two passes and completed one of them — and it was interesting. On the final play of the first half from the Lisbon 41, he threw a pass to Crabbs, who was about to be tackled at the 28.

But Crabbs then lateraled back to lineman Tyler Baxter, who rumbled 27 yards and nearly scored, but was tackled at the 1-yard line.

"Offensively we controlled the line of scrimmage well," Livengood said. "We just had a couple breakdowns in coverage on defense. Other than that, it was a good, solid win."

In 2020, the Flyers rolled past Southern at home in a 48-14 win in the first round of the playoffs. Last season, it took a 21-14 effort in double-overtime for the Flyers to top the Indians in a second-round home game.

Now, St. Paul gets a third matchup with the Indians — who beat fellow Firelands Conference foe South Central by a 65-21 score on Friday — but will this time make the long trip.

"They are big and fast and do a great job running the Wing-T with a lot of misdirection," Livengood said of Southern. "A lot of speed. We'll need a great week of practice to prepare for a very good team."

Lisbon 7 13 0 0 — 20

St. Paul 27 14 16 7 — 64

Scoring

STP — Jack Stieber 1 run (Ashton Stang kick)

STP — Quincey Crabbs 2 run (kick failed)

LDA — Austin Daley 31 pass from Trevor Siefke (Ben Weber kick)

STP — AJ Meyer 72 kick return (run failed)

STP — Drew Kuhnle 11 run (Crabbs run)

LDA — Luke Kraft 6 pass from Siefke (Weber kick)

STP — Crabbs 1 run (Ben Burger run)

STP — Burger 34 run (kick failed)

LDA — Logan Stauffer 5 pass from Siefke (kick failed)

STP — Crabbs 12 run (Crabbs run)

STP — Crabbs 17 run (Burger run)

STP — Stieber 7 run (Stang kick)