Immokalee dashes Mariner 37-6
The Mariner Tritons couldn’t get out of their own end of the field Friday night, and it wound up costing them. Immokalee (3-5) bottled up the Tritons and eventually ground down a valiant Mariner defense in taking a 37-6 District 5A-12 victory at Mariner.
Immokalee improved to 2-0 in District 5A-12, good for a share of the district lead with Dunbar, while the Tritons (2-5) dropped to 0-3 in district play.
“That’s what we’ve been preaching to our kids,” Indians coach Dale Moore said. “When we went and played Cypress (Lake), we said, ‘Hey, we’re zero and zero. Nothing else matters.’ Then we were 1-0, and now we’re 2-0.”?The loss pretty much put the playoffs out of reach for the Tritons.
“They did a great job,” Tritons coach Travis Smith said. “My hat’s off to Dale Moore. He’s doing a great job turning that program around. They had a rough start, and they’ve got them back in tune.”
Immokalee took advantage of the kicking game to score three touchdowns in less than seven minutes.
After punting to pin the Tritons back at their own 1, Immokalee forced a short punt that gave the Indians a first down on Mariner’s 30. It appeared the Tritons would hold, but on fourth-and-eight, Mac Joseph hit Jean Sanon for a 28-yard touchdown with 6:55 left until halftime.
Mariner fumbled the ensuing kickoff, setting up another short Immokalee drive from the 25. Joseph ran it in from the 4 and Fred Green added a two-point conversion.
A second short punt set up Joseph’s 28-yard scamper. This time Malcolm Jackson ran it in for the two-point conversion with 56 seconds remaining in the half.
“We can’t win games when the defense is on the field the whole night,” Smith said. “I give them credit. They fought their hearts out. We didn’t do a good job on offense. We put the ball on the ground on a kickoff. We didn’t play three phases of football tonight. The defense was on the field way too much.”
Immokalee opened the second half with an 80-yard drive that took up eight minutes of the third quarter. Green ran in for the touchdown from two yards out. Green added a one-yard run in the fourth quarter.
Cairo Juenegens hit Nick Simon with a 45-yard pass, leading to Juenegens’ two-yard run for the Tritons’ touchdown.
“We weren’t ready to play with them,” Smith said. “Offensively just couldn’t get the ball moving. We’ve got to do a better job with that. We put that much on the defense we’re not going to win the football game. We’ve got to do a better job on special teams, and we’ve got to do a better job on offense.”
The Tritons are home next Friday against East Lee County in a non-district contest.