Shut Up Fatty and Four Eyes: On That 91 Point Lincoln Win…
Shut Up Fatty and Four Eyes is a new feature on Oly Sports where my radio partner and friend, John McGlamery, and I discuss topics in the sports world that aren’t necessarily related to Olympia sports, though this one kind of is.
Lincoln beat Mount Tahoma 91-0 last night. Yeah, that really did happen. Let’s take a look at how it happened.
Jordan Kitna, the son of Lincoln head coach and former NFL quarterback Jon Kitna, started it off with a 25 yard touchdown run. He then threw a five yard TD and a 12 yard TD to give the Abes a 21-0 lead before an interception return gave them a 28-0 lead still in the first quarter. Up 28-0, Kitna threw for one more touchdown in the first, a 20 yard pass to Jayson Williams.
Up 35-0, Kitna then threw for four touchdowns in the second quarter (of 24, 14, 26, 29 yards) and Lincoln took a punt return to the house and took a 70-0 lead into the locker room. Kitna returned for the beginning of the third quarter but was pulled early on and the backups scored 21 more points to finish things off giving the Abes their biggest win ever, 91-0.
Kitna threw for 197 yards, seven passing touchdowns and one rushing touchdown. The Abes reportedly had a short field the entire game because of Mount Tahoma’s ineptness on offense and according to the Tacoma News Tribune’s TJ Cotterill, Mount Tahoma coach Rickey Daley didn’t feel like the Abes were running up the score.
Perhaps. But the fact is, Jordan Kitna was still throwing the ball up 28-0, up 35-0, up 42-0, up 49-0, up 63-0 in the first half. They may have been screen passes and nobody from Mount Tahoma was going to stop anybody from Lincoln, that’s probably true, but they couldn’t have just handed the ball off? Why was it necessary to keep throwing the ball?
These kind of things happen in high school football. Sometimes, no matter what a coach does, the other team can’t stop them. But having seen Lincoln first hand last year obviously run up the score on Shelton, I have a hard time giving Jon Kitna the benefit of the doubt.
At Highclimbers Stadium in 2013, Lincoln absolutely dominated Shelton. It wasn’t even close. Jake Beck, the poor quarterback for Shelton, and running back Jake Henry couldn’t even make it to each other for the handoff before a Lincoln defender was all over them. Jordan Kitna and the offense had their way and did basically whatever they wanted. The only reason that the score wasn’t higher was because of big mistakes and incredibly stupid penalties by the Abes, otherwise, it could have been a 91 point win.
Up 27-0 with 51 seconds left in the first half, the Abes called a timeout to stop the clock after a second down running play by Shelton. They then forced an incompletion on third and a punt on fourth. With 39 seconds left in the half, Kitna threw a bomb on first down that barely missed his receiver. On second down, J’Maka Love took a short pass and took it 70 yards untouched to the house and Lincoln took a 34-0 lead to the half.
Kitna returned for the second half and kept running their hurry up offense and kept on throwing. Their defense kept blitzing on every play and going hard after Beck and after not rushing the punter in the first half, they brought everybody at Colton Hubble on every punt in the second half. Because of their own mistakes, they only managed seven more points, but it was pure and utter domination and Kitna did not sit until midway through the fourth quarter in a 41-6 win.
After the game, the Abes celebrated like they had won the Super Bowl and in front of the Shelton crowd, they performed a terrible version of the Haka with multiple players doing backflips across the field in the background.
After seeing that performance last year and then hearing that Kitna played late into the fourth quarter last week in a 62-0 win over the Highclimbers (a game in which he threw five touchdown passes, two in the third quarter after they had a 36-0 halftime lead), it is hard for me to listen to Coach Daley and believe that the Abes weren’t running up the score in their 91-0 win over lowly Mount Tahoma.
I want to like the Abes. I want to like all the good that Jon Kitna has done at Lincoln. But these games in which he continues to have his son throw the ball despite absolute domination and with a huge lead are undermining that likability. I am not fan.
UPDATE: Here are Jordan Kitna’s highlights from the big win. Six of his eight touchdowns, at least. Watching videos of Lincoln play this season, the one thing you can say in defense of them is that they seem to be running the same plays no matter the situation. Not sure if that really is in defense of them, but I guess you can’t fault them for playing their game for the first half, at least.
Posted on October 4, 2014, in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. 5 Comments.
Oly Sports 
Lincoln left 13 points on the field by ‘only” kicking the PAT after their TD’s instead of going for 2.
I can understand them wanting to always play like the score is 0-0 even though they are blowing out teams 42-0 etc… etc… because in the end, Lincoln isn’t responsible for slowing themselves on offense, that’s the other team’s job, but their off-the-antics are pretty funny given the fact that they they still have yet to win something in the big stage.
They’ll probably lose 35-0 to Bellevue or something like that like all the other 3A teams when it’s all said and done.
Come on it’s Mt Tahoma. If there’s one game a season that Abes feel free to run the score it’s Mount T. 91 pts. Feels GREAT!
I covered the game. It was no run-up. It WAS one of the strangest things to ever witness though. Mt. Tahoma was unable to stop or start anything. Short fields led to quick scores over and over again. Had Lincoln stopped throwing short passes and ran the ball (which they also did) they probably would have only scored 84 points. Kitna never touched the field in the third quarter, that was erroneous reporting by the Tribune (who were not there).
I can’t believe you wrote this long of a story and you weren’t even at the game. They could have scored 140 points if they wanted to truly run it up. Your article waxes of sour grapes from some Shelton poundings. Sorry.
Fair enough, Justin. I’m glad to finally hear from someone that was at the game that didn’t have it in their best interest to say something bland. It’s hard to fault them for just playing the game they play for the first half and having watched the highlights, it’s obvious that no matter what Lincoln did, they were going to score.
Quick question for you: Did they run the hurry up for the entire first half or did they take getting up to the line easy?
And you are correct, there are a lot of sour grapes from that Shelton game last year. It was the most aggravating game I’ve witnessed in three years of calling games. They employed obvious tactics designed to run the score and punish a team that was so physically over matched that it was scary to watch. The behavior of the whole team that night from the players to the coaches that had no interest in reigning in their team has forever tainted my opinion of Jon Kitna and his coaching staff.
I’m not a reactionary typically, I’m not one to criticize coaches or referees and I especially won’t go after the kids, but my broadcast partner and I were left speechless by what we saw, especially the shameful final minute of that first half and the even more aggressive tactics they used in the third quarter when they had already long broken the Highclimbers team.
I am a player from Mount Tahoma. My Freshman and Sophomore year I wore the number 51. This year I wore 64. Though I am late to reply I just felt the need to say something. I read hmurchison’s comment “…it’s Mt Tahoma.” I’ll give you a perspective from my point. This is my 3rd year playing for this team and we have always taken crap from other schools and even our own school. That 91-0 blowout was crucial. I’d expect a little more class from Kitna but I guess they felt the need to embarass us. I just want to say.. You’ll see. Give us a couple years and this will NEVER happen again. THUNDER BIRDS FOR LIFE. MOUNT T OVER EVERYBODY. #GATA