Malta falls 20-14 to Shepherd

The Mustangs are facing a bit of an uphill battle as the team suffered their second loss of the season to the Shepherd Mustangs last Friday in Shepherd. The score of the game was 20-14.

Malta will be tasked with facing 1-1 Roundup this Friday. The Panthers will look to spoil Malta's Homecoming with a solid rushing attack that dismantled Rocky Boy 55-6 on Friday, September 2.

Though Roundup lost their season opener 46-6 to Huntley one week prior, Mustangs Head Coach Nick Oxarart knows the task of defeating the Panthers won't be easy.

"Roundup runs a Double Tight Double Wing offense with foot-to-foot lineman splits," Coach Oxarart said. "It is a hard offense to defend because it is kind of like a rugby scrum. They are very big up front and have a good quarterback and their running backs run hard."

Another task Malta will face is the fact that the tradition of Homecoming can be tiring and distracting to the young team.

"We have to have a good week of practice and increase our intensity when we are at practice," Coach Oxarart. "Roundup will have a great game plan since they were off last Friday, so they've had two weeks to prepare for us."

Though Last Friday's game was a loss, the game provided a young Malta team with valuable experience, one that Coach Oxarart believes will benefit the team.

"We were able to mature a little bit as the game went on," Coach Oxarart said. "Our players got a little better each quarter. We just need game speed experience. Playing teams like Shepherd and Huntley expose the weaknesses we have and hopefully we can correct them and move on."

Malta was led by senior quarterback Keenan Schipman, who had 105 passing yards with one passing touchdown and one rushing touchdown.

Schipman's touchdown pass was a 38 yarder to senior Ostin Welch who had six receptions for 86 yards.

"We got solid blocking up front and Keenan Schipman threw a nice deep ball to Ostin Welch," Coach Oxarart said. "Ostin was able to get behind their coverage and ran a nice route and made a great adjustment to where the ball was thrown and was able to score."

Trace Simonson had a strong outing on the ground, racking up 85 yards on 21 carries.

As a team, Malta had a total of 198 yards, 93 of which were on the ground. The team was 5-of-11 on third down and converted 1-of-2 fourth down conversions. The team also had 11 first downs.

Malta wasn't able to capitalize on big play opportunities throughout the game, while Shepherd was able to make big plays on early downs.

"We had some missed opportunities by dropping some catchable passes that may have allowed us to score. We just couldn't stop their offense when we needed to," Coach Oxarart said.

Shepherd boasted a solid run game averaging nearly 4.8 yards per carry, racking up 263 yards on 55 carries.

"We didn't match Shepherd's intensity to start the game and they kind of handled us pretty good the first quarter," Coach Oxarart said. "We were missing quite a few tackles. We were in great position but didn't get the job done and I give some credit to Shepherd's running backs and how hard they ran."

Coach Oxarart was still encouraged by the growth of his team this early in the season.

"Most of our players hadn't played any varsity football until this year and many guys are playing positions they haven't before and they are getting a little better each day," Coach Oxarart said. "We hope our non-conference games can give us the experience and maturity we need in order to compete well in our conference."