[Radio Announcer Voice]: This week on Dynamic Duos — BR-9 Thomas More continues to rock the D3 Football world with victory after blowout victory, most recently over BR-219 Grove City. The Saints posited their second highest score of the season, notching 66 points, while the defense surrendered just 14. This team remains perfect on the year with an 8-0 record with two games left to play.
Can anyone stop Thomas More? And More importantly, can anyone stop thrifty quarterbacks Jensen Gebhardt and Brenan Kuntz? Or the team’s top receiver Goose Cohorn? Or lead rusher Ct Tarrant? Find out in today’s Dynamic Duos, which is actually a pair of duos … but it still works … kind of.
[Cue theme song, which sounds something like this, except without the words, “Batman. Batman. Batman. Batman.”]
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This week saw Thomas More sophomore QB Brenan Kuntz explode for his highest stat totals of the season against Grove City. The 6-foot-4 backup threw a pair of touchdowns and notched 339 passing yards and 21 rushing yards in the win … something we all saw coming, right? Right?
Not really. In the seven previous games Kuntz broke the 200-plus mark twice, recording 228 yards against BR-223 Hanover in Week 2 and 247 yards against BR-179 Geneva in Week 6, a game that saw him post 100 rushing yards as well.
In truth, Kuntz hasn’t had to do a whole lot mainly because, well, he’s technically the backup QB. Or maybe he’s the co-QB. I don’t know. All I know is, he currently boasts 1,049 passing yards and 11 TDs on the season, while senior QB Jensen Gebhardt has 1,384 yards and 15 TDs.
Gebhardt didn’t even play against Hanover, Geneva or Groove City due to injuries. He was forced from the bout with Washington & Jefferson on account of an apparent head injury, leading to Kuntz stepping in and taking the reins — he finished 3-of-6 passing for 29 yards, not great stats, but he didn’t need to force it. He still guided the team to a 38-20 victory, prompting this quote from head coach Regis Scafe:
“Brenan plays every day. We feel that we have two quarterbacks. We don’t have to change our offense. They do things a little bit different, but they both run the offense, and it was great. He did a good job when he came in.”
Indeed, Gebhardt sat out the next game against Geneva and Kuntz went off for 247 yards and two touchdowns. If I sound like I’m repeating myself, I am. I said all of this in paragraph four, but I wanted to emphasize how cool it is for a team to have two starting-caliber QBs.
Of course, it helps to have players like running back Ct Tarrant and receiver Goose Cohorn. This duo accounts for 1,848 of Thomas More’s 4,415 offensive yards and 18 of the team’s 58 touchdowns.
Tarrant ranks as the No. 17 running back in the league (in terms of rushing yards) with 933 yards and 11 TDs in 144 attempts (a remarkable 6.4 yards per carry). The 5-foot-8 sophomore accrued 100-plus yards in five games this season, including back-to-back-to-back games in which he totaled 193, 172 and 141 yards — he also had two rushing TDs in each of those outings.
Cohorn currently ranks as the No. 4 receiver, in terms of receiving yards, with 913 on the season. The 6-foot senior also has nine receiving scores. Cohorn’s best performance came against BR-208 Thiel in Week 3 when he recorded 216 receiving yards and a pair of scores in the 60-12 blowout victory.
Intriguingly enough, neither player performs considerably better or worse with either QB under center. In the three games with Kuntz as starter, Tarrant averaged 121 yards and accrued five TDs. In the other five games with Gebhardt, he averaged 114 yards and managed six TDs.
Likewise, Cohorn averaged 111 yards and .75 TDs per game with Kuntz, and 116 yards and one touchdown with Gebhardt. Stats are fun.
Together this awesome foursome vaunts the No. 5 ranked offense in the nation and averages over 551 total yards per game. The Saints also lead the league in touchdowns with 58. Couple those stats with a Top-30 defense and you have yourself a pretty spectacular team poised to do some damage come playoff time.
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Typically, this is where highlights would come in. Unfortunately, after scouring YouTube, the only highlight I could find was from the Geneva game, an old, 2012 recruiting video featuring the cast of “300”, and a documentary on St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher. So here they are. If you have access to any Thomas More highlights, send them our way, we would love to include them (contact bhallow@herosports.com).
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