SOUTH EUCLID, OH -- The Notre Dame College football program overpowered the Hilltoppers of West Liberty University on both sides of the ball on Saturday afternoon in the program's first victory of the spring 2021 season with a final score of 70-7, and the offense combined for 506 yards of total offense while the defense forced three fumbles, two interceptions, and one sack in the effort to hold the West Liberty offense to 246 yards in the entire game. 

The Falcons struck first two minutes and forty seconds into the first quarter when Tabyus Taylor, a senior mid-year transfer from Virginia Union, introduced himself to the Falcon faithful by scoring the first touchdown of the season on a two-yard run. Taylor went on to score two more touchdowns in the first half with a ten-yard rush in the first quarter, and a 56-yard run in the second quarter, and finished with a total of 107 yards rushing on nine attempts, and averaged 11.9 yards per carry. 
The other rushing touchdown scored by the NDC offense was also in the first quarter and was a one-yard run by Jalen Boyd.

The passing game was also prominent in the win over West Liberty today, as quarterback Chris Brimm completed 13 passes 223 yards on 16 attempts, and two of which were connected with in the end zone.  The longest pass of the day was a 47-yard connection in the opening drive of the game with Napoleon Harris. Harris went on to finish with 60 receiving yards. Davis Patterson led the Falcons in receiving today, with 63 total yards on four recpetions and one touchdown, while the other touchdown was caught by Devanaire Conliffe.

On the defensive side of the ball, both Bryce Sheppert and Nik Cotton got thirty-yards on the stat sheet after intercepting a Hilltopper pass. Cotton broke up three passes, while recording three tackles on the day while Sheppert added two pass break-ups and two tackles. Dylan Spaeth led the defense with six tackles, while Jay Hinkle got the only sack of the day.

Together, the team put kicker Tanner Harding in position for 10 extra point opportunities, and the senior was successful on every attempt.

Today's win over West Liberty marked the first win of the Mental Era of Falcon football, which began in late December of 2019 when head coach Mickey Mental was named head coach. Coach Mental had a lot to say about his first win as a head coach, but started off with giving credit to his coaching staff. "These are challenging times and we've been through a lot as a staff. They prepared our kids as good as you can, and I'm very very grateful for their time and all their efforts to put a good product on the field. I inherited a very, very talented program from Mike Jacobs. The one thing that I can say that our kids do better than anyone else is they are hungry, day in and day out, to be better as both players and people. I am really grateful to be the head coach of these young men.

"More importantly, it was really exciting to watch our kids go out and have fun and PLAY. They played really well together, in all phases. Defensively, any time you force five turnovers and score twice that's big time. And when you hold a team to thirty percent on third down and 246 yards of total offense, that's HUGE. Defense wins championships, and our defense came to play today. 

"Offensively, I was really, really pleased with how balanced we were. 280 yards on the ground and 223 yards through the air with an 82 completion percentage in the passing game is great to see. I thought that Chris (Brimm) did a great job going through his progressions, and our offensive line were phenomenal in giving him time. Our running backs did a fantastic job, all three of them. I'm very proud of Jalen Boyd for coming back from an injury, and obviously Tabayus and Rob did a great job complimenting him at a high level. "The next step is to be consistent throughout the process, but today was a big shoutout to the offensive line because we cannot do what we do in the passing and running game without those five up front and Zaire helping out."

The Falcons are set for another Saturday in South Euclid next week as Frostburg State comes to town for another 2 p.m. kickoff.