First-half explosion guides St. Vincent over Grandview for its eighth straight victory

St. Vincent walked into one of the chilliest games of the year to date, but nobody told quarterback Nick Buchheit as the only chills he faced came from the ice in his veins. Buchheit diced up Grandview in a 42-20 road victory.

The Eagles forced a turnover on downs deep in their own territory to open the game, but from there it was all St. Vincent, as the Indians dispatched the hosts in the first half 42-0 to set up the turbo second.

Buchheit threw four touchdown passes in that first half, including a 32-yard dart to John Schwartz on a third-and-long as everything started turning up St. Vincent’s way.

“I thought we came out and played great,” Indians coach Tim Schumer said. “We executed, we took what they were giving us.

“I thought we looked good in the run game, but thought we looked really good in the passing game.”

Against run-heavy Grandview, led in no small part by the No. 75-wearing fullback Isaac Walker, the Eagles got some juice at times on the ground, but a physical St. Vincent defense kept them from stringing first downs.

While the Indian defense does more than enough to win most nights, it often comes with some caveat that the first-stringers give up some ugly plays. But against Grandview, the Indians’ first unit looked quite clean.

“Anytime you play a triple-option like they run, you have to be assignment sound,” Schumer said.

“I thought we were very assignment sound on defense and shut down the option to where they couldn’t do much, so I felt really good about our defense.”

Leaning on that big defensive line, as well as a hard-charging potential Semoball Awards candidate in Carson House at linebacker, the St. Vincent offense faced little to no pressure as the defense had its back from start to finish.

For Buchheit, who has become the leading passer in the Semoball area and a glaring candidate for all-state honors, he is beyond thankful for the support his defensive unit has given him this year, his first as a starter coming as a senior.

Paired with a phenomenal receiving unit, highlighted by Schwartz’s efforts this season as one of the top receivers in Southeast Missouri, maybe it’s easy, maybe it’s not.

Schwartz is no stranger to two-way dominance, and it couldn’t have been more apparent as he caught two touchdowns and scooped up a fumble to make sure Grandview stayed off the scoreboard.

After the opening turnover on downs, the Indians got a punt before a long, orchestrated drive between Buchheit and Jake Seabaugh, who caught a fourth-down ball and a long touchdown to get St. Vincent on the board.

The next drive, Clayton Gremaud got another long receiving score and one drive later Derek Garza came in and scored from 60-plus yards out to make it a three-possession lead and put this one out of reach, so it seemed.

Grandview notched a few scores in the second half against St. Vincent’s second unit, but the first unit came back to the field and closed this one out for good midway through the fourth.

The win kept the undefeated season alive but, more importantly, helped guarantee a share of the inaugural Quad County Conference title so long as Perryville wins Saturday against Herculaneum.

After getting a conference title last year thanks to a Week 9 win over Jefferson, it’s a familiar scene going into the final week of the regular season as no matter what happens to the Pirates’ it’ll be a de facto title game.

If St. Vincent wins, it’s a standalone conference title once more. If Jefferson wins, it’ll get its share of the conference crown whether or not Perryville gets a win Saturday: Maybe it’s full, maybe it’s split.

It’s been said plenty of times that this is a state-contending squad, but the conference title is first on the agenda right now, as it’s been for many weeks now, and the stakes are as high as ever going into Week 9.

After a blowout loss to Ste. Genevieve on Friday night, along with an earlier loss to a familiar Perryville squad, Jefferson comes into the matchup hobbling, but that won’t keep St. Vincent from coming in prepared.

Though the season’s focus certainly feels a lot bigger than a conference title, there’s a lot of pride on the line as the Indians eye yet another trophy, this time coming in the shape of the QCC crown.

“A three-way tie, sure, but we control our own destiny,” Schumer said. “All we gotta do is go win and we’re good.”

“We’ll be fired up.”