By Todd Stanford
TURBOTVILLE -- Lewisburg was missing its leading rusher in the regular-season finale Friday night, but it still had more than enough to top Warrior Run.
Nickolas Kifolo ran for two touchdowns and Cam Cassels threw for 108 yards and accounted for three scores as the Green Dragons romped to a 35-0 win in Heartland Athletic Conference crossover action at Defender Stadium.
With the victory, the Green Dragons (9-1) wrapped up their best regular season since a perfect 10-0 mark in 1981 and also solidified the No. 4 seed for the District 4 Class AA playoffs.
"No matter what happens in the playoffs, 9-1 is a great accomplishment," Lewisburg coach Todd Tilford said. "Coming into the season we had a lot of question marks. Things just went really well, and that's a credit to our kids."
Sophomore running back Merle Moscarello, who has 768 rushing yards for the season, was banged up, so he sat Friday night. But Tilford said he could have played if it were a playoff game.
Even without Moscarello, the Green Dragons' three-back tandem of Nate Brown, John Moscarello and Kifolo accounted for 124 yards and two touchdowns on 20 carries.
But Lewisburg's passing attack was just as effective. Cassels completed seven-of-10 passes, including a 41-yard touchdown throw to Cody Raup and a 24-yard scoring toss to Robbie Gaines.
"(Cassels) has come along really nicely," Tilford said. "He threw well on the run tonight, and the last couple of games he threw well from the pocket."
Warrior Run (0-10) got another solid performance from sophomore running back Austin Oberdorf. He had 89 yards rushing and another 53 through the air, with all the receiving yards coming on the final two plays of the game.
"He's the future," Defenders coach Chris Eiswerth said. "The kids really respond to him."
Lewisburg, which took advantage of five Warrior Run turnovers on the night, went up 7-0 in the first quarter when Cassels called his own number and ran 12 yards around left end for the touchdown.
That's the way it stayed until the second quarter, when the Green Dragons exploded for three scores. Kifolo was stopped on a first-and-goal from the 10, but he then bounced it outside and scored for a 14-0 lead. Cassels found Raup behind the defense for his 41-yard TD pass and Kifolo scored from four yards out for a 28-0 halftime lead.
In the third quarter, Cassels found Gaines down the right sideline, and the 6-foot-2 junior wide out-leaped and caught it inside the goal line.
"We saw a matchup we liked there," Cassels said. "(Gaines) is a real good athlete and he can jump pretty well. If I just get the ball high to him, he can make a play -- and he did."
