For the second straight week, the Hillsdale College football team showed off its new run-pass option offense. Once again, an opposing defense was unable to stop it.
The Chargers eased past the Walsh Cavaliers on Saturday night 28-10 behind a balanced attack on the ground and through the air. Sophomore tailback Joe Reverman tallied 128 total yards and two touchdowns, while sophomore quarterback Chance Stewart completed 18 of his 29 passes for 232 yards and three touchdowns.
Hillsdale ran 29 pass plays and 31 run plays. Head coach Keith Otterbein said he always tries to balance the number of run plays and pass plays, but with a run-pass option offense, the opposing defense dictates the play call.
Otterbein calls the play from the sideline, and Stewart reads the defense to determine whether it’s focused on stopping the run or the pass. After reading the movement of an opposing linebacker, Stewart decides to either hand the ball off or target a wide receiver.
If the quarterback can make smart decisions and accurate passes, the tailback can grind out yards, and the wide receivers can make plays in the air, it translates to a multi-dimensional offense that wears down an opposing defense.
For the Chargers, it translated into their first 2-0 start to a season since 2009.
“It gives us another factor to our offense that really can help us go forward and make us a better football team,” Stewart said. “If the defense wants to take away Joe Reverman, then I’m going to throw slants all day on them. If they want to take the slants away, then I’m going to give it to Joe Reverman.”
The Chargers added these run-pass option plays to their playbook in the offseason. Otterbein wanted to find a way to improve Hillsdale’s offense without starting over from scratch.
“What we’ve always really tried to do is stay true to what we are offensively, so it had to fit within what we do schematically. We didn’t want to create a whole new offense, so it just melded really well to the things we were doing in the past,” Otterbein said. “Knock on wood, so far it’s working pretty well.”
Reverman has picked up right where he left off last season in the backfield. The reigning GLIAC Freshman of the Year has 245 total yards and three touchdowns in two games. Since Stewart decides whether to hand the ball off or throw it while under center, Reverman doesn’t know whether he’ll get the ball until it’s in his hands.
“I just tell myself that I’m getting the ball so I’m prepared if he hands it off,” Reverman said. “Those plays have helped a lot because the defense can’t defend both the run and the pass at the same time. So if Chance makes the right decision, then it’s usually a positive play.”
In Hillsdale’s season-opening win against Indianapolis on Sept. 3, Reverman didn’t touch the ball during the Chargers’ first 10 plays of the game. Otterbein didn’t notice that fact until after the game.
“I was thinking, ‘Let’s go move the chains,’” Otterbein said. “It really keeps the defense off-guard for where they’re going to put their emphasis.”
A run-pass option offense needs a potent passing attack in addition to a good ground game. Hillsdale’s wide-receiving corps has demonstrated impressive depth in the first two games of the season.
Sophomore Austin Sandusky, sophomore Trey Brock, junior Taylor Cone, junior Timmy Mills, and senior Ryan Potrykus all possess “big play potential,” according to Otterbein.
“All five of those guys are playing really good football,” Otterbein said. “Throw any one of those guys out there, and let them make a big play.”
Brock caught 13 passes for 197 yards and a touchdown in Hillsdale’s win over Indianapolis on Sept. 3. Sandusky hauled in five passes for 115 yards and a touchdown against Walsh on Saturday. Eight different players caught a pass from Stewart against the Cavaliers.
“When we have four or five guys that can go make plays, it makes my job so much easier,” Stewart said. “They’re all just very unique and can help us win football games.”
Despite being recruited as a wide receiver, Sandusky played seven games last season at defensive back to help Hillsdale’s secondary which was struggling at the time. Otterbein originally didn’t want to play him at defensive back in his freshman season.
“If we had a magic wand we wouldn’t have tried that, but sometimes those things work,” Otterbein said.
Sandusky learned the offensive playbook before being put on defense and so he had to learn the defensive playbook as well. He said the transition back to offense in the offseason wasn’t as hard as going from offense to defense.
“I had a basic understanding of everything that was happening,” Sandusky said. “It was just a matter of rehearsing it again in my mind.”
Otterbein has been impressed with Sandusky’s ability to find openings in the defense. Sandusky showed off his speed on Saturday, getting behind Walsh’s secondary and catching a 32-yard pass for his first career touchdown.
“It was really special,” Sandusky said. “Everybody wants to score their first touchdown, and just to have it in a win was nice.”
A major component to the wide receivers’ successes on the field can be traced back to their time spent together with Stewart in the offseason.
“They were with me every day throwing and getting our timing down, just so that when it came to game time I knew on routes where they were going to be,” Stewart said. “They trust me, and I trust them.”
Sandusky called the wide receivers a really “close-knit group.”
“We can just joke around with each other, but we can also get after each other and that’s what a winning team needs,” Sandusky said.
Otterbein has been pleased with the group’s unselfishness.
“They’re doing a good job of being excited when somebody else makes a play,” Otterbein said. “Everybody wants a lot of touches, everybody wants to make plays, but they understand everything that happens in a positive way for us is good for them.”
Moving forward, the Chargers knows opposing teams will come up with ways to try to stop their run-pass option plays.
“Sooner or later somebody’s going to find a way to take it away,” Stewart said. “We’re just going to have to have our counter to that to add it back into our offense.”
The Chargers will look to improve to 3-0 on Saturday at Tiffin. Kickoff is at 3 p.m.
