Murphy, Edgewood get best of Mitchell in opener

Jacob Murphy had a few reasons to not feel entirely comfortable with his surroundings early on in Edgewood's season opening football game against Mitchell on Friday.

The sophomore was making his debut as a starting varsity quarterback and before he'd even taken a snap, one of his best blockers, Logan Anderson, suffered a broken finger in warmups. Then it took a series to get the running game warmed up as the offense had to sit for 10 minutes of game time waiting for its second chance to touch the ball.

For everything that was so new, Murphy's first touchdown pass, which gave Edgewood a lead it would never give up in pounding the Bluejackets, 38-16, was a familiar sight. He arched the ball perfectly to Andrew Good from 31 yards out early in the second quarter and would go on to throw two more TD passes.

More:Where's the 'Beef': Edgewood sophomore Murphy takes over at quarterback

"It was exciting," said Murphy, who goes by the nickname 'Beef'. "A lot of pressure, but I was ready for it. After the first couple of good plays I was ready to keep going."

He was simply on target all the time, finishing 12-of-16 for 140 yards, hitting eight straight passes at one point.

"We knew we could hurt them there with that two receiver set and run Andrew Good on that fade route," Edgewood coach Caleb True said. "That's a good ball that he always throws in practice and we've repped it, I swear, a thousand times since June. He was on point with that.

"I was glad to see his poise in the pocket. He stepped up when he could and moving around to avoid tacklers when he could."

Mitchell got to him once for a sack, but Edgewood was simply too balanced all night on offense thanks to Murphy's arm.

"We had a back-up corner and another back-up corner and they found our back-up corners," Mitchell coach Kevin Kling said. "They're a good staff and he's going to be a good football player. Give him a year to really figure out the system. I know he's only a sophomore so give him this year to really find his niche and I think you're going to see this team be pretty good."

Edgewood helped Murphy out by rushing for 248 yards on just 23 carries. Gabe Drew ran for 106 yards and two scores on just 11 carries while Stanley Oliver added 85 yards and a TD on nine carries.

"I knew coming out offensively we might be slow a little bit there," True said. "Just to get Beef's feet wet behind the center there. But once the offense started clicking, they got their motor running and we found ways to run power and counter at them get a little bit of outside zone with Gabe Drew. Stanley looked terrific, too.

"But I tell you, we did it all without Logan Anderson (who broke a finger in warmups). Before we even took a snap it was, 'Oh, we lost a linebacker, we lost a tackle. Luckily, Corey Holland stepped up big time (he had a sack and blocked a pass on the same series in the second quarter to stop a dive) and we were still able to pound the rock."

Growing pains for Mitchell

For a quarter, Mitchell had things going its way but never took advantage.

The Bluejackets had the ball for 10 minutes as Edgewood ran just three plays but the Mustangs' defense also came up with a couple of key stops that kept Mitchell off the scoreboard.

A tackle in the backfield by Gaeb Novak on first down led a punt on the opening possession, then two tackles at the line of scrimmage forced Mitchell to go for it on fourth down at the 18 to start the second quarter and a bad snap gave the ball back to Edgewood.

"When you're dealing with kids and trying to learn a new system, a new program and a new environment for playing football, you're going to have peaks and valleys," Kling said. "I thought for sure when we came out in that first quarter, that first drive, we held on to the ball for a while.

"Then we just shot ourselves in the foot, you have a couple of bad plays and you don't recover from that when you're an inexperienced team. When you look at this team, there's a lot of guys who haven't had a whole lot of playing time. So early in the year, we knew it was going to be a building process."

More:Five burning questions: How will Edgewood football look this year?

Mitchell finished the night with just 99 yards rushing on 40 carries, led by 73 yards from Carsyn Herald, and another 40 yards through the air from Ethan Turner, also making his debut as a starter, tossing for one score and running for another.

"He did a lot of good things, he did lot of rookie things," Kling said. "We didn't help him up front with protection a lot, but I'll take the hit for that. I don't know if we worked all the things that we needed to work to properly help him back there. Our kids played their gut out for us.

"We started to clean some things up in the second half and give him some time to throw. When we give him time to throw, he's pretty good."

Third quarter gallop

It was still a game at halftime, with Edgewood up just 12-0.

But that changed in the third. The Mustangs took the kickoff and put together a quick scoring drive with two long runs by Drew and capped by a 13-yard touchdown pass from Murphy to Grant Coffey at 10:16 for an 18-0 lead.

Mitchell had an answer, getting a five-yard TD run from Turner at the 5:57 mark with the conversion run making 18-8.

That's where the Mustangs showed some gumption and took over up front physically, marching to the 1 where Oliver finished it off for a 26-8 lead at 2:30.

"We knew what was hurting them and went right back to it," True said.

On Mitchell's next snap, Good picked off a Turner pass, giving Edgewood the ball at the Jackets' 32. A swing pass to Drew resulted in a second touchdown for the Mustangs in just 23 seconds and a 31-8 lead.

"We knew we had to score," Murphy said. "Coach was telling us in the locker room we had to get at least 30 points."

Penalties, penalties, penalties

There were 28 plays that ended with a yellow hankie on the ground.

Edgewood was whistled 18 times, costing the Mustangs 164 yards, while Mitchell was dinged 10 times for 90 yards. The mess ranged from a series of encroachment calls early on to several 15-yarders for unsportsmanlike conduct from players tackled out of bounds and over celebrating a touchdown.

"We came in at halftime and a conversation with the boys," True said. "We were supposed to correct that the second half. Those are things this program can't have. We don't act that way, we don't play that way. We have to play safe, play smart and play physical, but we've got to clean that up. We can't do that."

Injuries and missing players

Mitchell came in having to use too many players both ways and really began to wear down in the second half when Edgewood scored three times in under five minutes to pull away. Fresh bodies are coming but still needed to get more practices in to become eligible.

"You saw how many guys we had in street clothes," Kling said, nodding toward at least eight players not in pads. "A lot of those guys in street clothes are our depth. We got some depth coming. But when it's a new staff, new program, trying to get kids bought it and coming out to the program and some came out late.

"So we had to play with what we've got. We'll have at least eight of those guys next week."

For Edgewood, in addition to Anderson, Coffey also got banged up.

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Looking ahead

Mitchell, which has to play its first four on the road as it awaits the final installation of its new turf field, will have its hands full again next week against a Springs Valley squad that clubbed Eastern Greene in its opener, 43-6.

Edgewood will be back on its red turf next week to take on Monrovia, which ran past Ritter, 40-12. The Mustangs have started 2-0 just once since 2001.

EDGEWOOD 38, MITCHELL 16

MItchell (0-1) 0 | 0 | 8 | 8 — 16

Edgewood (1-0) 0 | 12 | 19 | 7 — 38

SECOND QUARTER

E: Andrew Good 31 pass from Jacob Murphy (kick failed), 9:57. E, 6-0.

E: Gabe Drew 7 run (pass failed) 2:58. E, 12-0.

THIRD QUARTER

E: Grant Coffey 13 pass from Murphy (pass failed), 10:16. E, 18-0.

M: Ethan Turner 5 run (Turner run), 5:57. E, 18-8.

E: Oliver 1 run (pass failed), 2:30. E, 24-8.

E: Drew 32 run (Ziggy Teran kick), 2:07. E, 31-8.

FOURTH QUARTER

E: Good 9 pass from Murphy (Teran kick), 9:56. E, 38-8.

M: Kale England 32 pass from Turner (Turner run), 3:25. E, 38-16.

RUSHING

Mitchell (40-99): Carsyn Herald 19-73, Blake Williams 6-29, Wes Hellatt 1-0, Dalton Ritchison 1-0, Ethan Turner 11-(-1), Owen Modglin 1-(-2).

Edgewood (23-248): Gabe Drew 11-106, Stanley Oliver 9-85, Gunnar Caswell 6-38, Jaxton Collier 3-13, Jacob Murphy 4-5, Isiah Giron 1-3, Gavin Morris 2-(-2).

PASSING

Mitchell (3-11-1-40): Turner 3-11-1-40.

Edgewood (12-17-0-140): Murphy 12-16-0-140, Collier 0-1-0-0.

RECEIVING

Mitchell: Kale England 2-38, Modglin 1-2.

Edgewood: Andrew Good 6-103, Grant Coffey 2-20, Drew 2-9, Ziggy Teran 1-10, Nathan Hixson 1-8.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Murphy, Edgewood get best of Mitchell in opener