By Terry Boehmker
NKyTribune sports reporter
After losing four straight games, Highlands football players got to actually enjoy mingling with friends and family members on the field following a 47-0 win over Dixie Heights in a Class 5A district game on Friday in Ft. Thomas.
Highlands coach Brian Weinrich didn’t want to put a damper on the post-game celebration, but he was already thinking about next week’s district game at Covington Catholic, the state’s top-ranked Class 5A team.
Highlands quarterback Carl Schoellman passed for 153 yards and three touchdowns in Friday’s game. (Photo by Ted Jackson)
“They shouldn’t be smiling too long, it’s CovCath week,” Weinrich said of his players.
“We’ve got a long way to go before we play CovCath,” he added. “If you’re at Highlands or CovCath right now that’s all we’re both thinking about. (Friday’s) game is over. We’ve got to get on with it. We’ve got to get a lot, lot better in a hurry.”
When the CovCath coaches put together a scouting report on the Bluebirds, they’ll be impressed with the big-play capability of senior wide receiver Nick Veneman. He caught five passes for 153 yards and four touchdowns in Friday’s game.
On three of his touchdown plays, Veneman raced past the Dixie Heights defensive back assigned to cover him and hauled in passes from senior quarterback Carl Schoellman that covered 40, 66 and 30 yards.
“We definitely thought it would be there because they’re a man defense and we like to take advantage of that,” Veneman said of the scoring strikes. “With my speed, I’m able to just run past them and stick it in a little bit on a fade (route). I’m pretty sure all three of them were fades.”
Highlands also did a nice job on defense in Friday’s victory. The Bluebirds posted their first shutout of the season by recovering three fumbles, intercepting a pass and stopping Dixie Heights on two fourth-down plays.
The turnovers had an added impact on the game’s outcome because Highlands was able to get a field goal after the interception and scored touchdowns after two of the fumble recoveries.
Nick Veneman
“We felt good defensively (coming into the game),” coach Weinrich said. “We had some guys back (from injuries), which really helped. We had some depth that we haven’t had in a while. The bye week was tremendous. We had a chance to heal up and rest and, at the same time, we could really focus on some things and get better at them.”
Before the scheduled bye last week, Highlands lost close games to Lexington Catholic and Simon Kenton in the final seconds that extended their losing streak to four in a row.
Dixie Heights had won three straight coming into Friday’s game. That streak ended because the Colonels couldn’t sustain drives with their run-oriented offense and finished with 215 total yards compared to 376 for Highlands.
Senior running back Brandon Barker was the workhorse in the Colonels’ offensive scheme. He rushed for 155 yards on 34 carries, but he also committed one of the team’s four turnovers on a fumble.
“Dixie plays that ball-control offense and they want to hold on to it,” Schoellman said. “The best way to stop that is get the ball from them and we were able to do that quite a few times.”
Schoellman ended up passing for 153 yards and three touchdowns while back-up quarterback Grady Cramer threw for 45 yards and two TDs. The Bluebirds rushed for 178 yards with junior Cooper Schwalbach picking up 76 on 11 carries and senior Larry Wilson getting 68 on 10 carries.
“It feels good,” Schoellman said after the victory. “We had some tough games we could-a, should-a won, but in the end these are the games that matter. We’re 1-0 in our district and have CovCath next week. That’s the big one. We’ll enjoy this win for now, but we’re going to keep moving on.”
DIXIE HEIGHTS 0 0 0 0 — 0
HIGHLANDS 19 7 7 14 — 47
H – Veneman 40 pass from Schoellman (King run)
H – Bowman 22 FG
H – Veneman 66 pass from Schoellman (Cramer run)
H – Veneman 8 pass from Cramer (Bowman kick)
H – Veneman 30 pass from Schoellman (Bowman kick)
H – Schwalbach 15 run (Bowman kick)
H – Roberts 28 pass from Cramer (Bowman kick)
RECORDS: Highlands 3-4, 1-0 district; Dixie Heights 3-5, 0-1 district
