SM West rips LHS, 35-7

Shawnee Mission West senior Darron Harvey swears he does not harbor any ill feelings toward Lawrence.

He just likes to play here.

Friday night Harvey was superb for the second time this season at Haskell Stadium in leading the Vikings to a 35-7 victory over Lawrence High.

“I just love playing on this field,” said Harvey, who gained 229 yards on 16 carries against LHS, two weeks after torching Free State High for 275 yards in the season opener. “We don’t get to play on grass very often and I just love how it feels.”

Grass, turf, dirt, asphalt. It probably would not have fazed Harvey no matter what surface he played on. The 6-foot-2, 205-pound back, who missed most of 2007 with a torn meniscus, ran wild against the Lawrence High defense, scoring on touchdown runs of 59, 35 and 70 yards in the first half.

Harvey’s 59- and 70-yard touchdown runs were the lone plays on those two drives. The 35-yarder was the third play of its drive. It proved to be the back-breaker in an otherwise competitive first half.

“We were in it,” LHS senior Jake Green said. “We just missed way too many tackles on defense. That guy’s a load. But a lot of teams are bigger than us. You just have to have everyone run to the ball and try to clean it up. One person is not going to tackle a back like that. He’s good.”

The Lions (2-1) jumped on the board first, scoring on their opening drive of the game when senior quarterback Clint Pinnick found senior wideout Aaron Rea for an 11-yard touchdown with 8:41 to play in the first quarter. Pinnick was 3-for-3 for 75 yards through the air on the seven-play drive, and, for a moment, the Lions actually had all the momentum.

“Clint’s just such a special football player, he finds a way to make things happen,” LHS coach Dirk Wedd said. “Unfortunately for us we just made too many mistakes on offense the rest of the way. You can’t give a good team like that snap after snap and expect to compete.”

West (3-0) tied the game when quarterback D.J. Balazs hit Trevor Arellanes for a 49-yard touchdown pass with 3:22 to play in the first.

From there, Harvey took over. He ran around people, jumped over them and even found a way to go through them. At halftime, he had 207 yards on 10 carries.

In the second half, the Lions did a better job of bottling him up, but still could not find a way to score. LHS reached the red zone three different times in the second half but came away empty all three times.

“We should have scored 21 or 28 points,” Green said. “We just made too many mistakes and didn’t take advantage of our opportunities.”

Most of the Lawrence High bright spots came in the second half. Senior tailback Clifton Sims continued to churn his legs and finished the night with 118 yards on 24 carries. Senior Murphy Ray Jr. picked off a pass in the fourth quarter and underclassmen Darren Sorem and Dom Reiske each came up with fumble recoveries.

Although disappointed by the loss, the Lions were not discouraged by their effort.

“Our kids will play hard,” Wedd said. “That’s not a problem. This is just a whole different level of football and we’re not ready for it yet. We still had a few question marks on this football team and a good team answered them tonight.”