High school football: Mountain Crest lays a beating on Highland

Mountain Crest backed up the preseason hype Friday night.

Capitalizing on a porous Highland pass defense, the Mustangs reminded everyone why they're regarded as the team to beat in Class 4A with a convincing 48-27 victory over the Rams.

Mountain Crest junior quarterback Alex Kuresa completed 21-of-29 passes for 372 yards and two touchdowns in a performance that was reminiscent of last year's semifinal against Timpview.

"He's still making plays, which is awful fun to see, he's just so accurate he finds kids open. And the receivers made good plays, they made him look good," said Mountain Crest coach Mark Wootton.

Tyler Weese was the recipient of many of those passes with seven catches for 196 yards and two scores.

Ironically enough, it was Mountain Crest's undersize defense that set the tone early, forcing Highland into a quick three and out. From there, Kuresa took over. He completed his first three passes and then hooked up with Weese on a 20-yard touchdown pass, putting the Mustangs ahead 7-0.

After another short Highland possession and a poor punt, Mountain Crest made the most of a short field, a 33-yard drive Alex Knowles capped with a two-yard plunge for the 14-0 lead.

It was one of only eight rushes by Mountain Crest in the first half, but with as dominant as Mountain Crest's passing game was in the first half, there was no need to run the ball as Kuresa complete 15-of-20 passes for 278 yards.

"I like running the ball a lot more than we did tonight, but like I said they're so big up front and they were coming so hard," said Wootton.

Highland's offense actually settled down after a few sluggish drives and whittled Mountain Crest's lead to 14-7 on Christopher Lloyd 14-yard run.

Unfortunately for Highland, it squandered a great opportunity to climb back into the game following back-to-back holding penalties on Mountain Crest's ensuing drive. On a third down and 27, Kuresa hit Weese for an 83-yard touchdown strike up the middle.

Instead of the likelihood of possession at midfield, Highland found itself trailing 21-7 following the second of two first-half TD receptions by Weese.

"We had a play called but me and Kuresa read it and we just audibled to a post rout," said Weese. "We've been playing together since little league so we kind of know where each other are going."

Before halftime Highland's Mason Keller scored on a 12-yard sweep, but Kuresa regained the multi-touchdown edge on a one-yard plunge late in the half for the 27-14 lead.

Any hope of a Highland rally was quickly extinguished early the third quarter as Knowles scored the second of his three touchdowns for the 35-14 lead.

Highland made the final score somewhat more respectable with two late touchdowns after falling behind 48-14.

e-mail: jedward@desnews.com