ALTON - Marquette Catholic's football team had a tough game Friday night in the home opener against Breese Mater Dei, falling 50-14.
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On the positive side, quarterback Kaleb Ware passed for 111 yards, and Marquette racked up 200 yards in offense and had 14 first downs in the game. The Explorers’ touchdowns came in the second quarter on a 35-yard pass from Connor Hampton to Zachry Smith and a fourth quarter five-yard run by Ware.
“Kaleb continues to play well,” Angleton said, “but we had the pick six, and three or four big drops. Those are points on the board, and we’re not experienced enough to leave those points on the table.”
The Explorers open Prairie State Conference play at home next week against Nokomis in a 7 p.m. kickoff, and Angleton knows that his side will be ready to play.
“We’ll see the film put it in our hip pocket and get ready for conference,” Angleton said.
Mistakes proved to be the Explorers’ undoing Friday night, as too many dropped passes and an 85-yard interception return for a touchdown spelled trouble for Marquette.
“We made more mistakes tonight, and their offensive line was able to take advantage of our size differential,” said Explorers coach Darrell Angleton. “We’ve got to clean up our mistakes, and that comes with experience.”
Marquette also gave up a Travis Jasper 79-yard punt return for a touchdown, and trailed 29-0 in the second quarter. The 29-0 Knight lead occurred on the interception return by Jasper.
In addition to the scores, the Explorers dropped two sure touchdown passes in the end zone.
“Those are the mistakes we can’t make if we’re going to become a good team,” Angleton said.
Dan Brannan also contributed to this story.
