Wayland was 3-1 in Week 4 of the football season and lost five in a row to finish at 3-6. But four of the five losses were to playoff teams, two of them unbeaten.
Forest Hills Central was the latest chapter in the sad skid, polishing off a perfect 9-0 regular season campaign with a 35-0 shellacking of the Wildcats, with all of the scoring coming in the first half.
Wayland made things easy for the invaders in its second play from scrimmage by coughing up the football on its own 25. It took the Rangers just four plays to cover the distance, with running back Moise Guerrier taking it in from the six-yard line.
Forest Hills proceeded to score on all four of its subsequent possessions, shredding the Wayland defense with a combination of passes by southpaw QB Luke Majick and the signal-callers’ keepers on the run. The second TD was a spectacular 48-yard aerial to junior receiver Tate Hallock, son of former Detroit Lion Ty Hallock and FHC assistant coach, who put on a couple terrific fakes and raced untouched into the end zone.
Majick in the third drive picked up 69 yards on five keepers and scored from a yard out late in the first quarter.
Hallock put on another show moments later by returning a punt 64 yards for an apparent touchdown, but it was nullified by an illegal block in the back. No matter, the Rangers went 59 yards to the end zone in the fourth drive and Cameron Deines scored from a yard out, marking the second time in the evening that a stop at the one by Seth Sevenski-Popma merely delayed the inevitable.
Tyler Chiramonte had the same fate with just a little more than a left until intermission, halting Deines at the two, but on the next play he wedged into the end zone.
Daniel Rizer put on a kicking clinic in that first half by booting five extra points and kicking the football into the end zone on six consecutive occasions. The Wildcats had to start every drive from their own 20.
Wayland picked up just three first downs in the first half. One came on a terrific pass catch by Lee Misak, who outdueled two defenders in near midfield on a 42-yard play. An 8-yard pass from QB Carson Sevigny to Carter Morse netted another first down, Coby Dressler picked up 23 yards on the last play of the half, just about the only rushing play that garnered double figures in yardage.
The second half started with a running clock, and neither team managed to score in those latter 24 minutes.
Misak came up with a clutch tackle on Deines on a fourth and four at the Wildcats’ 30 to halt a Ranger drive for the first time in the evening.
And Morse, playing in his last game, caught a 41-yard pass in the third quarter to get the ball down to the Forest Hills 29. But a couple of sacks later, Austin Wrobleski was given a chance to dare to be great with an attempt at a 47-yard field goal. He missed.
Wayland threatened one more time before the final gun sounded, Morse returned to his old quarterback slot and clicked on passes to Misak and Dressler to put the ball on the 15 of the Rangers. But they came up with an interception in the end zone to secure the shutout along with the undefeated season.
The brightest spot for the Wildcats was that Sevigny and Morse combined threw the ball for better than 100 yards. But the rushing yardage was miniscule.
