Capital 43, Wilmington 0
(COLUMBUS, Ohio)--Capital University's football team, ranked No. 5 in the nation, opened Ohio Athletic Conference play with a 43-0 shutout of Wilmington College Saturday in Bernlohr Stadium.
Capital goes to 2-0 (1-0) with the win and has an OAC-best eight-game regular season winning streak, while Wilmington falls to 0-2 (0-1 OAC).
Capital blocked Wilmington punts on the Quakers opening two possesions to give the Crusaders short fields and set-up their first two touchdowns.
The Crusaders took the opening kickoff 63 yards before missing a 23-yard field goal, but then on Wilmington's first possesion Capital got a blocked punt from Shaun Hausler (Hilliard/Hilliard Davidson) to give them the ball on the Quaker 35-yard line. Eight plays later Capital senior quarterback Rocky Pentello (Columbus/Westerville South) hit fellow senior Graham Holmberg (Newark/Newark) on a four-yard touchdown pass to make it 7-0 with six minutes left in the first quarter. Wilmington started the ensuing drive on its own 17-yard line, then losses seven yards and then a blocked punt by Zac McKenzie (Hilliard/Hilliard Darby) gave Capital the ball on the six-yard line. Senior runningback Jeremy Mulkey (Dublin/Dublin Coffman) then pounds the ball into the endzone two plays later to end the first quarter with Capital up 14-0.
Capital's defense would take over in the second quarter as Wilmington had only five total yards on offense, while the Capital offense put up 17 points as Pentello hit tight end Dylan Kelly (Hilliard/Hilliard Darby) for a 23-yard touchdown pass, junior placekicker Matt Spitz (Xenia/Xenia) nailed a 34-yard field goal and Mulkey had a one-yard touchdown run with 16 seconds left in the half to give the Crusaders a 30-0 halftime lead.
Pentello tossed his third scoring strike of the game with a 37-yard catch and run to junior Derrick Alexander (Grove City/Grove City) to make it 37-0. The drive was set-up by a 34-yard interception return from senior linebacker Sam Abdullah (Wrothington/Thomas Worthington). Spitz finished the scoring with a 28-yard field goal with 47 seconds left in the third quarter.
Pentello finished 22-of-32 for 228 yards with three touchdown passes. His 32 attempts gives him a school-record 1,223 passing attempts. Pentello once again shared the wealth hitting 10 different receivers with Alexander catching a game-high six receptions for 87 yards. Mulkey had five catches for 42 yards to go along with a game-high 15 carries for 68 yards on the ground.
Capital outgained Wilmington 393-119 and the defense had four sacks and 12 tackles for loss. Senior Nick Bucci (Hudson/Hudson) led the Crusaders with five stops.
Backup quarterback Billy Blackburn led the way for Wilmington as he came off the bench and led the offense as he went 9-of-19 for 70 yards passing and had a team-best 23 yards rushing.
Capital hits the road for the first time in 2006 next week as they travel to play Heidelberg College next Saturday at 1:30 p.m. in Tiffin.