PLYMOUTH - Plymouth's football team is known as the Rockies, but it played more like Rocky, as in the boxer, Friday night against Warsaw.

And the knockout punch came early.

The No. 10 (4A) Rockies scored three times in the second quarter and cruised to a 50-0 win over the Tigers in the Northern Lakes Conference opener for both teams.

Plymouth dominated Warsaw, rolling up 372 total yards to Warsaw's 96. The Tigers have not scored a single point in the first eight quarters of the season.

"We knew we were up against a big obstacle tonight," Warsaw coach Phil Jensen said. "They have some kids that can play on that team, and more than just the five or six skill players. They executed their game plan better than we did.

"We got beat soundly by a great football team, and we know what we have to do to get better," he said.

Plymouth's early opportunities were helped by some gambling by Jensen. In an effort to jump start a stalled offense, the first-year Tiger mentor decided to go for it on fourth down situations twice in the first quarter, and Warsaw failed to convert on either one of them.

But Plymouth took advantage of both.

On Warsaw's first possession of the game, the Tigers failed on a fourth-and-one from their own 41. Five plays later, the Rockies' Mike Tremaine juked his way in from 19 yards out.

Later in the first, Warsaw misfired on a fourth-and-eight from the Plymouth 39, and that led to a 34-yard run by Ryan Colvin early in the second quarter.

Plymouth scored twice more in the second quarter on a 15-yard fumble recovery by Nick Wise and a three-yard run by quarterback Matt Cramer. By halftime, it was 30-0 in favor of Plymouth.

"I take a lot of the responsibility tonight for giving them some of their momentum by going for it on fourth downs a couple of times," Jensen said. "I felt like we had done some good things and had a couple of good plays and had fourth and short. You hope as a coach that you can make something happen. Last week, the one thing we didn't do was take advantage of opportunities against Valley.

"I was really committed to try to create some opportunities and create some momentum for us early," he said. "When that didn't work, we paid the price. I put us down 20-0 by my game plan and the decisions I made."

It didn't get any better for Warsaw in the second half as Plymouth continued to score at will, getting a six-yard scoring strike from Cramer to Colvin in third quarter and an 86-yard run from Rob Riewoldt and a 26-yard jaunt from Bobby Salinas in the final quarter.

As the Plymouth offense was rolling along, it continued to get good field position all game long as Warsaw could not muster any offense for the second straight game.

Warsaw managed just the 96 total yards (28 in the second half) and five first downs.

"Our offensive line has to get better, we have to get more aggressive," Jensen said. "We have some kids that have skill and talent, and we have to block some people.

"We are going to work on our techniques and work on our aggressions and maybe look at moving some people around and some new kids," he said. "We are going to keep working to fix problems. I am not disappointed in effort, but at the same time, we need to find some performance."

Derrick Duncan did manage to shine early for the Tigers, rolling up 58 yards rushing on 12 carries.

Riewoldt had just 90 yards on two carries while Colvin ran for 87 yards.

Plymouth showed while it will contend for the NLC crown with the near 400 yards total offense, a week after getting 396 yards in a 35-14 rout of LaVille.

The road doesn't get any easier for Warsaw (0-2, 0-1) as it is at defending 3A state champs South Bend St. Joseph Friday. [[In-content Ad]]