Yoder: Nasir Collins carries Trojans to victory

By Kenny Varner Jr.
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Updated: August 23, 2025

By Joshua Yoder

MOUNT UNION – Well it certainly was a tale of two halves for Mount Union, but nonetheless the Trojans managed to get off the 2025 season with a win over the Tussey Mountain Titans in ICC football action Friday night.

For the majority of the opening quarter, neither team really was able to get their respective offenses going. That was until late in the period as the Titans were charging down the field and caught the Mount Union defense off guard as quarterback Owen Miller launched a 36 yard rocket to Jax Garner for a touchdown. But, Tussey Mountain failed on its two point conversion attempt making it a 6-0 lead.

It was pretty much the same way during the second quarter as both offenses continued to get the ball into the endzone. But once again, the Titans scored late in the period as with 34 seconds remaining of the half, Miller found Camden Chilcote for a 16 yards touchdown. Again however, Tussey Mountain failed on the two point attempt extending the lead to 12-0.

But this time though, Mount Union wasn’t going down without a fight. Offensively the Trojans had a total of 11 yards of total offense at this point, but sophomore quarterback Maddox Hobbs quickly turned up the heat hitting back to back passing, starting with a 25 yard pass to Collins to then set up another 25 yard pass to receiver Ty’Jeir Hooper for the touchdown with just eight seconds left. Jamok Ranck nailed the extra point to cut the lead down to 12-7 heading into the break.

Mount Union had a total offense of 61 yards for the first half while Tussey Mountain had 142 yards of total offense.

But things began to change real quick in favor of the Trojans especially Collins who just went off. It started with just 8:40 remaining of the third as Collins found his opening and powered his way down the field and completed a 40 yards touchdown run to give the Trojans their first lead of the night.

With the score now at 14-12, Collins struck again, this time he went 15 yards to the house and helped extend the Mount Union lead to 21-12.

Then during the fourth quarter, Collins made his presence felt again, however this time it was on the defensive side of the ball where he collected an interception and nearly made it to the endzone, only to be stopped short. But teammate Micah Atherton finished the rest and muscled his way in for the score. Collins then threw a two point pass to Hooper to make it a 29-12 ballgame.

But the Titans refused to quit as late in the period, they went up tempo offensively and found their way back into the endzone for the first time since the first half and quarterback Miller finished off the drive with a QB sneak. But again, the two point conversion failed making it 29-18.

Mount Union took control of the ball and put the game on ice. For the second half, the Trojans had a total of 161 yards of total offense with 135 of those yards belonging to Collins who in the first half was held to just negative eight yards for a grand total of 127 yards for the day on the ground to go along with his one catch for 25 yards, two rushing touchdowns and also an interception.

Defensively, the Trojans came up big as they held the Tussey Mountain offense to just 88 yards for the entire second half. Brayden Richards also collected a sack.

Mount Union starts off the 2025 season at (1-0, 1-0) and will look to keep the winning ways going next Friday as the Trojans will travel to face the Berlin Brothersvalley Mountaineers at 7 p.m.

Until Next Time!