HARTFORD 鈥 Junior quarterback Vinny Inga set the offensive tone early and the Germantown defense took it from there.
Inga accounted for three first-half touchdowns and the Warhawks bookended halftime with a pair of defensive stands en route to a 20-0 nonconference victory over Hartford on Thursday night.
Inga passed for two scores and ran for another as the Warhawks scored on three of their first four possessions for a 20-0 lead.
鈥淭hat was huge against a team like this,鈥 Germantown coach Jake Davis said. 鈥淵ou can see what they can do. After that, they hunkered down defensively. They鈥檙e a good team, no doubt. So, when you can get up on a team like that, it definitely helps.鈥
Germantown went 70 yards in 12 plays on the opening possession. Inga completed 3 of 4 passes on the drive, including a 10-yard scoring toss to Liam Hagland.
The Orioles went three-and-out on their first possession, then were called for defensive offsides on the Warhawks鈥 first play. Inga was bottled up on a keeper to the left, but cut back right, broke a tackle and went 55 yards up the right side to make it 13-0 with 6:02 left in the first quarter.听
鈥淎 big thing we preach is that when they鈥檙e pushing the front side, there鈥檚 always those cutback lanes,鈥 Inga said. 鈥淭he defenders overrun it and I saw that. A guy sort of wrapped me up, but I cut back, and I knew immediately as I did that, that I was gone. We鈥檇 been preparing for that all week and to see it in a game really was exciting.鈥
After forcing Germantown to punt on its third possession, the Orioles fumbled it away on the opening play of the second quarter. The Warhawks needed just four plays to increase the lead to 20-0 when Inga hit Christian Griffin with a perfectly thrown 32-yard scoring strike.听
The second-game script was almost the opposite for Germantown, which outscored Homestead 13-0 in the second half听of the season opener for a 25-14 victory. In that game, Inga ran for two scores and passed for the other two.
Hartford, which found the end zone five times in a 34-31 season-opening win over SM天地论坛 West, struggled early on offense and was hampered by costly penalties.
The Warhawks defense made stops inside its 10-yard line to end the first half and start the second half.
鈥淭hose were huge. I was so proud of our defense to be able do that,鈥 Davis said. 鈥淓specially early in the season, to be able to get those things done. It just builds the confidence in our guys and the things that they can do. I just loved their grit and how they hunkered down and kept them out of the end zone.鈥
The Orioles put together their first sustained drive in the closing minutes of the first half, moving from their own 42 to a first-and-goal at the 7. Bennett Klages鈥 first two pass attempts were incomplete, then Hartford was penalized for a false start. Darrius Peete then picked off Klages鈥 pass at the goal line and returned it to almost midfield before the play was whistled dead because Peete lost his helmet.
The Orioles opened the second half with another sustained drive, overcoming a holding penalty and moving from their own 34, but EJ Brown was stopped short on fourth-and-1 from the 7-yard line.
鈥淲e take the ball and drive down to the 7-yard line and then we get the next opening drive, and we just can鈥檛 put the ball in the end zone,鈥 Hartford coach John Redders said. 鈥淲e just couldn鈥檛 connect when we needed to. We had opportunities to pull within one touchdown, and we don鈥檛.
鈥淲e鈥檝e got a lot of juniors playing, learned a lot of lessons. Last week we ended up being on the winning side, this week we鈥檙e on the losing side. Definitely a lot of coachable moments that we鈥檙e going to have.鈥
