By Rick Cassano

CINCINNATI – Another dominating performance showed that Harrison High School’s football team is living up to its own expectations.

Senior quarterback Brady Lawhon had another standout showing and the Wildcats’ defense registered its second straight shutout to open the season Friday night as Harrison rolled to a 28-0 road victory over McNicholas at Penn Station Stadium.

“Like I’ve said before, we’re going to be special,” Lawhon said. “I’m just glad we’re doing what we’re doing.”

Lawhon completed 13-of-18 passes for 220 yards and two touchdowns while running 20 times for 92 yards and a score. Ben Markarian, Jack Denier, Aaron Davis and David Baldock all snared interceptions in the winning effort.

The Wildcats, who kicked off the campaign with a 35-0 road win over Milford, have now secured back-to-back shutouts for the first time since 2001. That season, Harrison beat Amelia 28-0 in Week 5 and Turpin 27-0 in Week 6.

“This team’s great,” said Davis, a junior safety. “We all bond well. The brotherhood’s great. We pick on each other in practice and know what to expect in the game. I feel like we can have a deep run in the playoffs this year. Our confidence is sky-high, and we’re not going to lose it either.”

The Wildcats nearly tripled the Rockets in yardage (442-154) and certainly had opportunities to expand their point margin, but fumbled the ball away at the McNick 1-yard line and also missed a 31-yard field goal.

Harrison coach Derek Rehage wants his squad to decrease its number of penalties – they had seven for 80 yards against the Rockets – but he loves the passion he’s seeing from his guys on a daily basis.

“We’ve got some high-strung kids who just love ball and want to play ball all the time. It’s just a matter of controlling some emotions a little better,” Rehage said. “We know our schedule’s a gauntlet, but we’ve got big aspirations. We’ve talked about how this is the best unit we’ve had. We’re excited about what this team can do.”

Lawhon connected with Colton Rehage and Kyle Davidson for touchdowns, with Rehage collecting seven receptions for 99 yards. Trey Fette also scampered for a TD.

McNick (1-1) hadn’t given up more than 17 points in its last 10 games before Friday’s affair.

“Hats off to Harrison. They’re a really, really good football team,” Rockets coach Mike Orlando said. “They were absolutely better than us tonight. I’m just really disappointed in some things from us.

“Typically we’re really good tacklers. Our defense over the last couple years has been really good and that’s a seasoned bunch, but we just didn’t do that today. Missed assignments, missed touchdowns … we gifted them a lot of yards with poor execution. It was a bad night to have a bad night.”

The Wildcats began the game with an 80-yard drive that culminated with Lawhon’s 44-yard touchdown toss to Davidson. The extra-point attempt was thwarted by a mishandled snap.

Harrison’s second possession ended with a lost fumble at the McNick 1 early in the second period. Lawhon took the snap and had the ball knocked out of his hands by a lineman.

“It was just miscommunication,” Lawhon said. “I came out with the snap and it was too wide. It was all me. I need to be tighter in the chest.”

It was the only turnover for Harrison, which added two touchdowns before halftime on a 7-yard run by Lawhon and a 24-yard pass from Lawhon to Rehage.

Wyatt Dennis contributed 91 yards on 19 carries for the Wildcats. Their yardage total was almost evenly split between passing and running.

“It starts and ends with 11 every day. He’s the man. He’s our leader,” Derek Rehage said of Lawhon. “We try to stay balanced and give teams a hard time with the tight end-wing stuff and where we line those guys up. You follow 81 (Christian Roether) and 1 (Colton Rehage) with the defense and you’re going to be pretty successful if you can stop them, but they’re both really talented football players.”

Lawhon said he’s just one part of the machine.

“We have a bunch of playmakers on the team,” he said. “The defense is just playing great. They’ve picked it up the last couple weeks, and it’s been awesome.”

McNick struggled to find any kind of rhythm Friday. The Rockets couldn’t run the ball effectively against an HHS defense that got 16 tackles between Baldock and Izzy Taylor, and quarterback Evan Sandfoss was limited to 92 yards through the air (42 came on one play).

Harrison has six interceptions through two games, three by Markarian.

“We’re super long, so that makes it tough in the back,” Derek Rehage said. “We’ve got a great group back there. They’ve played a lot of 7-on-7.”

Davis said the Wildcats were fully prepared for McNick’s passing game and eager to go on a ball-hawking mission.

“We expected them to throw deep on us all game, and we were waiting,” Davis said. “All the DBs were great tonight. We felt loose. We wanted them to challenge us.”

Orlando said he warned his crew about turnovers after the Rockets gave the ball up twice in their season-opening 31-10 triumph over Turpin.

Sandfoss suffered a foot injury with 5:02 remaining Friday and came out of the game. Orlando said he had a tough night, “but it’s not all on Evan. He wasn’t alone. He had a bunch of buddies with him making mistakes.”

Tyler Richardson ran four times for 42 yards to pace McNick on the ground. He crossed the goal line on a 10-yard run with 3:31 left, but the touchdown was wiped out by a penalty.

Orlando said perhaps the most disheartening part of the evening was that the Rockets didn’t display their usual vitality.

“I thought we were beyond that, particularly with a senior-heavy bunch that’s been through some battles,” Orlando said. “Harrison looked like a (Greater Catholic League) team. They looked like a good Badin team or a good Alter team that we’ve been up against, so I was a little disappointed with how we reacted.

“I’m not taking anything away from Harrison. That’s a put-together football team. They’re physical and wear you down. But we shot ourselves in the foot with every opportunity we had. Hopefully this is the low point for us and we’ll move on from here. There’s a lot of season left.”

Both teams will face unbeaten opponents on the road next Friday. Harrison plays Beavercreek, while McNick meets Ironton.

Harrison 6-15-0-7 -- 28

McNicholas 0-0-0-0 -- 0

H: Kyle Davidson 44 pass from Brady Lawhon (Conversion failed)

H: Lawhon 7 run (Christian Roether pass from Davidson)

H: Colton Rehage 24 pass from Lawhon (Michael Wiesemann Jr. kick)

H: Trey Fette 21 run (Wiesemann kick)

Records: H 2-0, M 1-1