Collins carries Mount Union in Big Win!

By Kenny Varner Jr.
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Updated: August 31, 2024

By Joshua Yoder

MOUNT UNION – Sophomore Nasir Collins was putting in work as the Mount Union Trojans defeated the Berlin Brothersvalley Mountaineers by the final score of 20-7 in an Inter-County Conference football game Friday night.

The Trojans got on the scoreboard first as mid-way through the opening quarter, Mount Union managed to muscle its way down the field and finished the strong drive with freshmen quarterback Maddox Hobbs punching the ball in with a six yard run. Although the extra point was no good giving the Trojans a 6-0 lead.

Nearly four minutes later in the period, the Mountaineers answered with a big time play from their senior quarterback Mac Foor who launched a rocket down the field where fellow senior, wide receiver Zander Ritenour beat his man hustled down the sideline to complete a 52 yard touchdown pass. Berlin was able to get the extra point thanks to junior kicker Seth Kimmel which gave them a 7-6 lead. Unfortunately, this was the final time that they were able to get into the endzone.

Then in the second quarter, Mount Union was able to take the lead back with 8:47 to go completing yet another solid drive down the field and completed it with a nine yard touchdown run by Collins. Josh Ryan then scored the two point conversation to make it a 14-7 Trojan lead.

It was very much a defensive game for the vast majority of the second half as both defenses were not budging and creative on each other’s respective offenses.

With the third quarter completely scoreless, it appeared as though it was going to be the same during the final quarter of the night. But that soon changed as the Mount Union defense stopped the Mountaineers’ offense and forced a turnover on downs which gave their offense great field position.

However, there was a little over a minute left in the game and Berlin was out of timeouts so the Trojans were just looking to run the clock out.

That was when the biggest play of the game happened for the Mount Union offense as Hobbs handed the ball over to Collins who at first tried to run the ball inside but there were no running lanes. Somehow that didn’t seem to bother Collins too much as he quickly turned on a dime and hustled his way to the left side where he found nothing but green and scored a 22 yard touchdown run to put the game on ice.

The Trojans offensively compiled a total of 262 of total offense for the whole game. 241 of those yards came on the ground.

Most of the yardage came from the sophomore running back as Collins had 99 yards in the first half and then 65 yards for the second half for a total of 164 yards on 23 carries to go along with his two rushing touchdowns.

The Mount Union defense had itself a big day on the field as well. The Trojans held the Mountaineers to just seven points after they had scored 42 points the previous week. Defensively Mount Union allowed 127 yards in the first half and came down even harder in the second half holding the Berlin offense to 98 total yards of offense.

Mount Union moves to (2-0) overall and (1-0) in the ICC and will look to keep the winning ways going next Friday as the Trojans will hit the road to do battle with the Curwensville Golden Tide. Game time will be at 7 p.m.