Cascade Christian continues to assert itself as South Sound’s 1A power, shuts out Charles Wright

If you want to know how good sixth-ranked Cascade Christian’s defense was in Saturday’s 41-0 victory over Charles Wright at Sunset Stadium in Sumner, consider this ...

At halftime, the Cougars’ defense had outscored their offense 14-7.

It was that kind of night for Cascade Christian, who ultimately dominated in all phases of the game, improving to 4-0 in the 1A Nisqually League and 6-1 overall. The victory over the Tarriers, who entered the game tied with the Cougars for first place, puts Cascade Christian in the driver’s seat to win the league championship.

“We focused on the defense all week long,” Cascade Christian coach Randy Davis said. “Our run defense has been solid all year long. We were a little suspect at times on the pass. We worked on that, and I think we fixed some things during the week. Hopefully we carry that forward.”

Cascade Christian’s offense started the scoring in the first quarter, when sophomore quarterback Parker Johnson found senior Tyquan Coleman on a deep crossing route for a 24-yard touchdown.

Thanks to a couple of defensive touchdowns, the offense wouldn’t have to see the field much more in the first half.

Senior Tanner Carle and junior Donovan Scott each had interceptions returned for touchdowns in the second quarter. Carle’s return covered 12 yards, while Scott had to go 56 yards.

Not only did the Cougars defense score points, but it didn’t allow the Tarriers to have much success moving the ball. Charles Wright finished the game with minus-12 yards rushing, and just 105 yards passing. Charles Wright sophomore quarterback Dane Jacobson threw the ball 29 times, but managed just 3.62 yards per attempt.

The first half belonged to the defense, the second half belonged to Coleman. The speedy senior caught nine passes for 164 yards and two touchdowns to lead the Cougars’ offense.

“He’s huge,” Davis said. “You could see that they had keyed on (running back) Madden (Tobeck). They weren’t going to let Madden run wild like he has, so we have to go other places, and that just opened Ty up. He did a great job tonight catching the ball, and he’s shifty and quick.”

Tobeck, the son of former Washington State University of Seattle Seahawks center Robbie Tobeck, ran 14 times for 72 yards. Think about this — his 5.1 yards-per-carry average Saturday night was almost 10 yards fewer than his 14.4 ypc average coming into the game (62 carries, 893 yards).

But Johnson’s favorite target throughout the game was Coleman, who finished with more than half of Johnson’s completions and yardage.

“We work on it a lot at practice,” Coleman said. “With our chemistry and stuff like that, just getting the ball in certain spots where the (defensive backs) might be doing a certain thing guarding me, depending on what route I’m running.”

Johnson finished the game 14-for-21 for 249 yards three touchdowns and two interceptions. Two of his three touchdowns came in the third quarter, which put the game away for the Cougars.

“He’s only a sophomore, so he’s learning all the time,” Davis said. “That’s the thing I love about Parker, usually he’ll make a mistake and it won’t happen again. He’ll come along. (Charles Wright) had some good defensive schemes. He did a great job, found open guys most of the time and threw the ball really well.”

This story was originally published October 14, 2017 at 11:51 PM with the headline "Cascade Christian continues to assert itself as South Sound’s 1A power, shuts out Charles Wright."