He’s done it all this season on defense for the Kentridge High football team.
Thursday night at French Field, Dylan Zylstra showed off a new wrinkle to his game – offense.
Zylstra, one of the state’s top linebackers, pulled in a 9-yard touchdown pass from quarterback Caleb Smith in the opening quarter that proved to be all the Chargers would need as Kentridge upended Kent-Meridian 27-3 in a South Puget Sound League North Division game.
“It was my first touchdown ever at any level,” said Zylstra. “We’ve been practicing all week. It’s a simple cross route where I just fade into the back corner of the end zone … (the quarterback) throws it and I just go up and get the rebound.”
Smith delivered a beauty to Zylstra, which gave the Chargers (6-2 in league, 6-3 overall) an early 7-0 lead, which was plenty enough to stand up on this particular night.
“Offensively, we moved the ball better tonight,” said Kentridge coach Marty Osborn. “We’ve made some changes with our injuries (to running backs Cameron McKernan and Devin Topps) and Dylan has just come over to the offense and basically learned receiver in the middle of the season. He took off No. 60 and put on No. 1 and look at him go.”
Kentridge already had a playoff berth in hand before the victory. Now, however, the Chargers must wait and see how the Kentwood-Kentlake game unfolds Friday night at French Field. If Kentwood wins, the Chargers will take the SPSL North’s No. 3 seed to the playoffs and play at Skyline (5-0, 7-2) next Friday night. If Kentlake wins, the Chargers will take the SPSL North’s No. 2 seed and play either Inglemoor or Issaquah at French Field next Friday.
Going into the postseason with a win is huge, Zylstra noted.
“This is huge. All week we had a bad taste in our mouths (after falling to Kentwood last week 13-7) and this game, we wanted to come out and get fired up,” Zylstra said. “We wanted to come out and get our pistons firing and get ready to go.”
Kentridge pushed its 7-0 first-quarter lead to 13-0 shortly thereafter on a 5-yard touchdown run by Alex Tyson. Kent-Meridian (0-8, 0-9) cut the deficit to 14-3 as time expired in the second quarter on a 32-yard field goal from Eddie Zhao.
That’s as much as the Royals could muster on the staunch Kentridge defense. The Chargers forced four turnovers – two fumbles and two interceptions. Nico White and Austin Berry both came away with interceptions.
White’s interception led to a 3-yard touchdown run by Donovan Ward with 9:59 left in the third quarter and pushed KR’s lead to 20-3.
Smith wrapped things up offensively for the Chargers midway through the fourth quarter, scoring on a 5-yard run.
It was the fourth time this season Kentridge has allowed fewer than 10 points in a game.
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