Western Boone Jr. - Sr. High School

It was a little bit of a slow start for the Western Boone football team on Friday night when they hosted Crawfordsville for their first ever Monon Athletic Conference game. But all it took was one play to change that, and once the Stars got rolling, it was tough to stop them in a 41-17 win over the Athenians. "It was good to get that win," Western Boone head coach Justin Pelley said. "I finally saw some glimpses of the Western Boone identity tonight on defense. They lit the fire in the team. Coach Rodriguez and his staff, they did great. Our guys came out to play, they set the tone and then we got it going eventually offensively." The Stars moved the ball in the first quarter, but turned it over twice and found themselves tied 0-0 after a quarter. But early in the second quarter, David Puckett got WeBo on the board with a fumble recovery in the end zone. After a three and out by Crawfordsville, Maverick Kraus and Jack Mallory got through to block a punt, which Puckett recovered on the Athenian 7. Jake Smith then rushed it in to give the Stars a 14-0 lead. "Our defense really set the tone and let our offense settle in," Pelley said. "We had three turnovers tonight (on offense) and that's not something we normally do. But our defense did a great job of getting stops and turnovers to set us up and let us get rolling." Western Boone's offense, namely the running game, got going as the game went on. Smith added a 20-yard touchdown run late in the second quarter to make it 20-3. Brennan Kopriva added a 1-yard touchdown run in the third quarter. Malachi Christy and Nathan Thompson capped the scoring with a late touchdown. Smith rushed for 188 yards in the game, and Western Boone ran for 296 yards as a team. 'Jake Smith and our O-line did a great job of finishing, and we hadn't seen that in the first two weeks," Pelley said. "We are getting there. Teams know what we are going to do, and we are aware of that, but we are getting better too. It is just getting back to what we do, running the football and playing great defense - tonight we showed glimpses of that." Kopriva was 5-of-7 for 62 yards in the game. The Stars, now 1-2, will host Greencastle on Friday. "We haven't watched them yet, but we know they can spread things out and run the ball a little bit," Pelley said. "They have played good teams in the past and it will be good to play somebody different. We picked up Lebanon and Tri-West weeks one and two and had a tough time, but we are used to playing those guys. Seeing someone different will be fun." Will Willems is the Sports Editor of the Lebanon Reporter. Follow him on Twitter @Will_Willems.