This story has been corrected

OSAN AIR BASE, South Korea – Ty White led the way with three touchdowns and Seoul American unleashed a punishing ground game in a 39-18 victory that evened its record at 1-1 in the Cougars’ DODDS Korea season opener.

The game was played on a school night due to the annual Korea Thanksgiving holiday of Chu Sok – and the anticipated heavy highway traffic associated with the holiday this weekend.

Better line play and fewer mistakes, coach Rydell Wilkins said, helped the Falcons rebound from a 21-7 home loss five days earlier against two-time defending Far East Division I champion Kadena.

“We got a little better tonight,” Wilkins said. “We had a little more consistency in the line play. We still had a few errors, false starts and turnovers, but overall we got better as a team.”

White set the tone with a 22-yard touchdown run on the game’s first possession. He added scoring runs of 15 and 6 yards later in the first and in the second quarters.

Josh DeCastro took over in the third and fourth periods, adding TD runs of 6 and 10 yards. Alex McDonald’s 6-yard run capped the scoring in the final quarter.

That was more than enough to overcome two touchdown catches by Ibrahim Mustapha and a touchdown run by Patrick Lunsford, who along with star running back B.J. Bryant left the game with injuries, two of several suffered by the Cougars.“Bryant, that’s big for us,” coach Aaron Mundy said of a player he calls the “physical, emotional leader” of the team. Kenny Mack Stewart replaced Lunsford, the Cougars’ starting quarterback, and threw a 20-yard, fourth-quarter TD pass to Mustapha to close the scoring.“Seoul executed better, their power running game was more than we could handle,” Mundy said.

Wilkins complimented the Cougars, saying they didn’t give up to the end. “Aaron has turned that program around; he’s doing a great job,” Wilkins said, adding that he thinks the Cougars will give reigning two-time DODDS Korea champion Daegu American “some problems.”

Osan’s next game is Sept. 24 at Zama American. Daegu and Seoul American journey to Okinawa next weekend to wrap up their interarea season series, Daegu at Kadena at 4 p.m. and Seoul American at Kubasaki at 7 p.m. Saturday.

CorrectionIncorrect players from Osan were credited with touchdowns and Alex McDonald was misidentified in an earlier version of this article.

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