Alter downs Dunbar to advance in DIII playoffs

“It’s a blessing," he said afterward. “We trained the whole month of two-a-days for this, and we’re ready.”

There is not much mystery to what Alter wants to do when the Knights have the ball. Run it.

They have more than one way to do it, though, as Dunbar learned early on Friday night.

Antonio Murphy Jr., Alter’s 253-pound fullback, softened up the Dunbar defense early before giving way to McDonald, who went in untouched from 15yards out for the first touchdown of the game with 7:03 left in the first quarter.

The Knights mixed option and off-tackle plays as they marched 70 yards in 10 plays to start the game.

“We kinda knew they were gonna bite in on that because everybody knows we run the wishbone, so we switched it up a little bit and tricked 'em a little bit a couple of times," McDonald said with a big grin. “They were definitely biting on Antonio Murphy.”

After Dunbar answered with a 33-yard touchdown pass from Greg Packnett to Shaun Huffman, the Knights went to work on the ground again. They went 73 yards this time (mixing in one pass for 22 yards) with McDonald again going over right tackle for the score, this time from 17 yards out.

When McDonald went in again from 23 yards out to put the Knights up 21-7 with 4:21 left in the second quarter, Alter senior lineman Matthew See could be heard yelling, “It’s just that easy!”

After the game, he explained, “When the energy is up and it’s high-stakes like this, you have to show your energy a little bit.”

But the Wolverines wouldn’t go down without a fight.

They spent most of the third quarter deep in Alter territory, seemingly just a play from making it a one-score game.

The threat was finally put down when Alter cornerback Harper Mitchell stepped in front of a Packnett pass and returned it out near midfield.

The Knights then needed five plays to drive 46 yards for a clinching touchdown, a 1-yard sneak by quarterback Brian Shane.

Credit: Bill Lackey

Credit: Bill Lackey

After Packnett hit Huffman for another touchdown from 17 yards out, Alter’s C.J. Hicks capped the scoring on the night with an 11-yard touchdown run for the Knights with 3:32 left.

“We’ve got athletes, plain and simple,” See said. “We’ve got one of the best running backs in Branden and we have C.J. and ‘Tone, a bruiser of a fullback, and Pat (Connor) out at wide receiver. We’ve got options so we can change our game style at any time.”

Alter advances to face Trotwood-Madison (4-0) next Friday night at Trotwood-Madison.

Dunbar coach James Lacking said the Wolverines are considering playing more games in the regular season but nothing was set yet.

“I take my hat off to Alter," Lacking said. "I appreciate all the Dunbar fans that came out to support us. I appreciate our guys not giving up. In the heat of the moment we had some guys that uplifted each other and supported each other.

"The energy was there. We just didn’t make plays. We knew they were gonna run that ball. They’ve got the big fella McDonald and some beef up front with (Derrick) Shepard (Jr.), so we knew they were gonna run the ball, and the better team won today.”