Jonathan Martinez (12) sprints to an open hole when USC played St. James in the opening round of the playoffs.

The United South Central Rebels’ football team ran into a buzzsaw when they played the Mayer Lutheran Crusaders in the Section 2A semifinals on Saturday afternoon, Oct. 28.

The Rebels were unable to get across the goal line and score any points, while the Crusaders scored two touchdowns in the first and second quarters, and one touchdown each in the third and fourth quarters.

The Crusaders also successfully kicked all six tries at PATs.

The final score of the game was 42-0.

Mayer Lutheran now moves on to the Section 2A Finals to face Lester Prairie for the right to go to the State Tournament. Meanwhile, USC’s football season came to an abrupt end.

The Crusaders scored on drives of 53, 20, 49, 40, 43 and 51 yards. The Rebels, meanwhile, had their drives end with six punts, a fumble and a turnover on downs, plus the end of the first half and the end of the game.

USC actually had nearly the same number of plays that Mayer Lutheran had. The Rebels ran 40 plays and the Crusaders had 42 plays.

And, the Rebels actually had the ball for more time of possession than the Crusaders, 25:34 to 22:26.

But, in all the other stats, the domination of the Crusaders was pretty clear.

Mayer Lutheran had 16 first downs to USC’s four, and racked up 296 total yards of offense to the Rebels’ 69.

All of USC’s 69 yards came on the ground. Jonathan Martinez gained 22 yards on nine attempts and Byron Getchell had 21 yards on seven totes.

Blake Bullerman added 14 yards rushing on four runs. Gavin Grunzke and Gavin Bird each had 11 yards – Grunzke on three carries and Bird on four.

The Rebels attempted three passes in the game and did not complete any of them.

Mayer Lutheran gained 216 yards rushing on 36 attempts. They also gained 80 yards through the air, on 4 of 5 passing.

The Rebels faced the Crusaders in their first game of the season this year, on Friday, Sept. 1, with Mayer Lutheran defeating USC 28-6 in that game.

The Rebels had a bit of an up and down season, going 5-5 overall and 4-4 in the Gopher Conference.