CONVERSE -ÊWith all the talk about Manchester's David Barrett, it's easy to overlook the fact that the Squires have an exceptional football player in senior quarterback Rex Reimer.

Reimer has more than 1,000 all-purpose yards this season. While most of those yards came through the air, he is still a threat to run the ball.

That was evident Friday as Reimer rushed for 146 yards on seven carries as Manchester rolled over the Oak Hill Golden Eagles 38-7 on its way to a rematch with No. 4 (2A) Heritage. Heritage handed Manchester its only loss of the season.

Manchester set the tempo of its game against Oak Hill early on.

On Oak Hill's first drive of the game, the Golden Eagles drove the ball down to Manchester's 43-yard line. Faced with fourth and inches, Oak Hill gave the ball to fullback Kevin Warnock. As soon as Warnock got the ball, he was meet behind the line of scrimmage by linebacker Greg Groombridge.

As they've been accustomed to doing all season long, the Squires took advantage of their opponents' mistakes.

The Squires mounted an 11-play, 58-yard drive that was capped off by a 5-yard rumble by Barrett.

After a three and out by Oak Hill and a punt that netted only 15 yards, Manchester had the ball on its own 48 looking to deliver an early knockout punch. That punch appeared to be delivered when Reimer called his own number and ran 50 yards to put the Squires up by two touchdowns with 3:10 remaining in the first quarter.

Oak Hill's next possesion was abruptly ended when Manchester's Groombridge recovered an errant snap. The Squires drove down to the Golden Eagele's 20 yard line. That's as far as they would get as Reimer left a pass hanging for Oak Hill's Cory Key. The turnover would do little as the Golden Eagle's gave it right back on a fumble three plays later.

Oak Hill would finally break into the scoring column with 17 seconds left as Oak Hill quarterback Kyle Wert connected with Brent Peterson from seven yards out.

Despite being outplayed on both sides of the ball, Oak Hill's half ending score left the heavy underdogs down only two touchdowns. If the Golden Eagles were to have any chance of making a comeback they would need to stop Manchester on their first drive of the second half.

Oak Hill was able to stop the Squire. For one play. On a second down and seven Reimer called his own number once again this time going 65 yards for the touchdown.

"Oak Hill was keyed up on stopping Barrett." Said Manchester coach Al Bailey. "That allowed for Reimer to have a great night."

That would be all the Squires would need as Oak Hill struggled to put together a successfull drive all night. That's not saying much considering Oak Hill only had three possesions in the entire second half.

Now as Manchester looks to next week's game against Heritage they are faced with the same dilema teams facing Manchester have had all year long. That's stopping a great rusher. In this case it's Brandon Robison who passed former Indiana standout Alex Smith's record of 6,895 carrer rushing yards.

"Heritage has a great team. They got the leading carrer rusher in the state. But with a great individual player like that it's easy to forget they have a great team also." Said Coach Bailey.

Manchester now 10-1 will host that game against Heritage. [[In-content Ad]]