With road victories the night of Sept. 6, the Marshall Statesmen and McLean Highlanders each improved to 2-0 for the second straight season in high-school football action.
Marshall blew out the Falls Church Jaguars, 49-0, and McLean downed the Lewis Lancers, 28-12, in non-district games.
• For Marshall, which has outscored its two opponents 128-6, Ethan Lebkisher and Joshua Paine each ran for two touchdowns. Lebkisher’s scoring runs were from four and 45 yards and Paine’s from seven and 34.
In addition, quarterback Michael Spriggs scored on a one-yard run, Alexandre Milbrink scored an a 17-yard run and linebacker Kevin Aleman added a touchdown on a fumble return.
Lebkisher had 128 yards rushing, Paine 49, Milbrink 38, Brandon Kitchel 22, Aleman 19 and Spriggs 14.
Randy Park made all seven extra points.
• Leading McLean for the second straight game was the play of first-year starting quarterback Christian McNeill. He was 15 of 19 passing for 324 yards and threw three scoring passes, covering 46, 57 and 68 yards. Justin Ball had an interception return for McLean’s other touchdown, and Nathan Bender booted four extra points.
In his first two games, McNeill, a linebacker for McLean last season, is 24 of 31 passing for 530 yards with six TD passes and one interception.
“I’ll take this after two games from a kid who was a linebacker until July,” McLean coach Joe Cockerham said.
McNeill was asked to switch to quarterback after last-season’s starter Ethan Ball decided not to play this fall to concentrate on baseball during the spring.
“We knew he [McNeil] was very athletic, and since he hadn’t played the position before, he had no bad habits, and he does what the coaches tell him to do,” Cockerham said.
Aidan Reid had six catches for 110 yards and a touchdown for McLean, Sebastian Carmenates had four for 106 and a score, Steven Conroy had two for 58 and a TD, Logan Blake caught two for 16 and Ben Irish had one catch.
Bryan Contreras-Torres was McLean’s leading rusher, with 63 yards, and McNeill ran for 48 more.
McLean amassed 435 total yards.
Leading the McLean defense was Carter Brown with 12 tackles and Ball with five tackles and the interception return.
