NAS SIGONELLA, Italy — The Sigonella Jaguars stormed into next week’s Division III championship game at Baumholder with a 49-18 victory over the Menwith Hill Mustangs on Saturday.

According to Sigonella coach Matt McKown, the Jags struck on the second play of this nine-man game, when quarterback Larry Stevenson connected with Marco Summerfield for a 55-yard TD pass.

Sigonella (5-0) then turned the game over to its “four-headed monster” option running attack, which responded with 371 total yards and four rushing TDs, two by Jeff Lastrella and one each by Joseph Coleman and Summerfield. Kahlil Bowen led the ground attack with 155 yards; Lastrella added 87 yards.

Stevenson, whose arm accounted for the rest of Sigonella’s 442 yards of offense, also connected with Summerfield for a second TD.

“Before the first quarter was over, Sigonella was up 21-0 and never in danger of relinquishing the lead for the remainder of the game,” McKown wrote in an e-mail Saturday. The score reached 35-0 at halftime.

“Menwith Hill put up a fight until the end as Lawrence Alston (151 rushing yards, two TDs) and Chris Jackson (73 rushing yards, one TD) led a second-half Mustang attack, McKown wrote. The Mustangs started the second half with two long TD runs by Alston, to cut the deficit to 35-14.

“However,” McKown continued, “Sigonella went back to the ground game and wore down the Mustang defense with long runs from Kahlil Bowen (22, 65 and 40 yards) in the third and fourth quarters that seemed to break the Mustangs’ spirit and lift Sigonella into its first-ever DODDs football championship game.”

McKown said the Sigonella defense was “extremely stingy” in the first half, holding Menwith Hill to negative total yards. The Jaguar defensive unit was led by linebacker Joseph Coleman (eight tackles, two sacks), linebacker Brandon Albert (nine tackles) and defensive end Austin Flanagan, who was in the Mustang backfield constantly.

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