GOSHEN — Returning punts and kickoffs was a positive area Friday for the Fairfield Falcons in a 48-29 NECC loss to the Lakeland Lakers. Senior Brett Baumgartner returned four kickoffs for 124 yards (31.0 average) with a long of 40, freshman Mitch Dewitt two for 20 (10.0) with a long of 12 and senior Coty Garris one for 10. Junior Cameron Kitson returned two punts for 32 (16.0) with a long of 23 and senior Alex Mast one for 30.

Kicking game

Falcon senior Eldon Burtsfield averaged 43.5 yards on four punts in the Lakeland contest. He boomed a 52-yarder in the first period that forced the Lakers to begin at the L-16. He also had two touchbacks on kickoffs.

High octane ground game

Lakeland rushed for 342 yards in the Fairfield contest and for the second week in a row had a pair of running backs run for 100-or-more yards. Senior Joey Fuller gained 177 on 19 attempts and classmate Cory Troyer 118 on 14.

A total of eight different backs carried the ball for the Lakers.

“We have a number of backs that run hard,” Lakeland coach Keith Thompson said.

The Laker rushing attack helps open the passing game. Junior quarterback William Kelly was 12-of-16 passing for 242 yards.

Senior tight end Logan Owens had a big game for the Lakers with three catches for 111 yards. He had a 13-yard catch on third-and-15 that led a TD run by Troyer at 9:57 of the second period, a 39-yarder that moved the ball to the F-ll setting up another TD run by Troyer at 6:11 of the second and a 41-yarder that set up a TD pass to Troyer from Kelly.

Warrior streak

Wawasee edged Warsaw 14-13 on Friday for the third-straight win in the series for the “W” Trophy. It’s the fourth time the Warriors have won three in a row in the series with the Tigers that started in 1970 with an 8-8 tie.

Wawasee won 27-0 in 1974, 31-0 in 1975 and 48-21 in 1976; 7-6 in 1985, 14-7 in 1986 and 14-12 in 1987; 31-0 in 2004, 42-14 in 2005 and 42-21 in 2006.

Young QBs

Both Wawasee and Warsaw had sophomore quarterbacks playing Friday due to either an injury or a dismissal from the team. Gage Reinhard tossed two scoring passes for Wawasee and Jake Mangas two for Warsaw.

Reinhard connected with classmate Clayton Cook on a 26-yarder at 4:13 of the second period on with Cook on an 8-yard at 7:42 of third as the Warriors went up 14-0.

Mangas led a fourth-quarter rally by the Tigers with TD passes of 5 yards to senior Taylor Cone at 10:50 and a 20-yarder to Coon with :35 left to play.

Mangas has a connection to Wawasee as his father Tim played basketball for the Warriors graduating in 1987. The elder Mangas scored 144 points as a sophomore for a 14-8 team coached by John Wysong, 401 as a junior for a 9-13 team coached by Wysong and 485 as a senior for a 16-5 squad coached by Gary Goshert. His career total of 1,030 points is fifth in school history.

First downs a plenty

The NorthWood Panthers’ offense ground out 29 first downs (25 rushing) in a 27-24 win over Elkhart Memorial. The team rushed for a total 441 yards as the Cleveland brothers combined for 270. Freshman Tanner Cleveland had 186 on 25 carries and senior Blake Cleveland 108 on 20.

Despite all the rushing yards, it was a 12-yard pass from junior quarterback Will Kirkwood to senior wideout Nick Graber for a third-down conversion that helped the Panthers run the clock out.

Air Kramer

Memorial’s junior quarterback Blake Kramer passed for 318 yards in the NorthWood contest for first-year Charger coach Bill Roggeman. Kramer completed 21 of 30 attempts. He tossed three TDs to senior wide receiver Dimitri Chatman as the Chargers rallied in the fourth period.

His first TD to Chatman pulled the Chargers to within 14-10 at halftime. NorthWood was leading 23-10 in the fourth before Chatman caught scoring passes of 94 and 20 yards.

He finished the contest with 11 receptions for 228 yards.

Basketball on grass

In Indiana nearly every sport at one time or another gets compared to basketball and looking at the score of the Fort Wayne Snider-Elkhart Central game on Friday you have to wondered if the school’s basketball coaches were looking on for scoring tips.

The Central Blue Blazers were down 52-20 after three quarters before outscoring the host Panthers 31-14 over the final 12:00.

Senior wideout Spencer Schnell set Central records with 18 catches for 303 yards and senior quarterback Nick Faus tossed a record six TD passes, three of them to Schnell. Faus was 37-of-52 for 457 yards.

Double duty

Concord’s Franko House pretty much does it all for the Minutemen. The senior, who recently verbally committed to play basketball at Ball State next season, plays tight end on offense and defensive line on defense for the Minutemen.

But House’s game duties started even before kickoff Friday night during the Minutemen’s 31-28 loss to NLC rival Concord: House performed with the Concord Singers as the school’s vocal team sang the national anthem.

Rare streak

One of the hallmarks of Concord football over the years has been consistency, and with the Minutemen’s loss to Plymouth Friday night, Concord has lost two games in a row for the first time since 2009, when the Minutemen dropped games to Plymouth, Northridge and Warsaw in successive weeks.

Before that, you have to go back to 2003, when the Minutemen lost the first two games of the season to East Noble and Elkhart Memorial, to find multiple consecutive losses by Concord.

Two by land

Friday night’s Concord-Plymouth matchup ended up being a ground battle: Plymouth typically doesn’t throw the ball much, and the Rockies stuck to their usual game plan Friday night: Plymouth completed just one pass for 51 yards, but the Rockies made it count: A TD pass from quarterback Ike Castner to receiver Dakota Brooke.

Concord, meanwhile, usually mixes it up on offense, but the Minutemen’s passing game was ineffective Friday night, mustering just 51 yards.

The two teams combined for 603 rushing yards Friday night: 360 for Concord and 243 for Plymouth.

Redskin O-line shines

Kudos to Goshen’s offensive line which opened huge holes for the Redskins to pile up 218 yards on the ground during a 21-3 homecoming win over Northridge at Foreman Field.

Those Redskins up front include 6-6 (272) senior Hunter Warrick and 6-3 (270) junior Mitchell Watts at tackles, 5-9 (247) senior Austin Miller and 5-9 (235) senior Alberto Velazquez at guards and 5-9 (221) senior Tyler Beasy at center.

Senior Justin Klabusich had 109 yards rushing and classmate Skylar Stevens 77. Sophomore Derek DeMeyer was an efficient 6-of-10 passing with both Klabusich and senior Austin Henke catching two apiece and senior Hans Singer a fourth-quarter scoring toss.

DeMeyer even delivered a block on one of Klabusich’s runs.

Shutout artists

Goshen’s defense played its second game without allowing a touchdown. The other was in a 2-0 victory at Elkhart Memorial.

Northridge was limited to one first down and 31 total yards in the second half after senior Trevor Ouimet kicked a field goal just before intermission.

Senior linebacker Jesse Good was constantly in the Raider backfield while Henke was brilliant in pass coverage. Junior Austin Weirich also had a sack.

Senior Travis Pickard saw some action at linebacker for the Redskins. He sat out last week’s game at Warsaw with a sprained knee sustained the previous week at Concord.

Senior Tyler Slagel took over at quarterback for Goshen late in the contest.

Raider injury woes

Sophomore Payton Carson, wearing No. 34, started at quarterback for the Raiders in the absence of junior Tanner Love who sat out due to a concussion.

Northridge’s biggest gainer of the night came on a 23-yard pass from Carson to sophomore Travis Schlabach in the opening period with junior Craig Kasten delivering a crisp downfield block.

Schlabach also had a tackle for loss on defense and junior Logan Bontrager a sack.

The Raiders lost sophomore fullback and linebacker Cam Ridenour late in the first period with a leg injury.