By RYAN ARENA

L’Observateur

RESERVE — Entering Friday night, local rivals Riverside and St. Charles had not faced off in a district game since 2006.

At least for the Comets, it was worth the wait.

SCC quarterback Henri Faucheux tossed four first half touchdown passes, and Jeffrey Hall had 202 total yards and scored four of his own as the Comets routed Riverside, 48-7.

Faucheux had perhaps the most impressive game of his young career as the team’s first year starter. He was 11-of-14 for 222 yards, almost all of it coming in a first half that saw SCC (7-0, 4-0) jump out to a 28-0 lead.

Picking up the slack for an injured Marcus Hall – he’d leave the game after accumulating 88 yards on 15 carries due to an ankle injury – Jeffrey Hall rushed for 139 yards on 11 carries and added 62 yards on a touchdown catch.

“Coach told me that I had to put it in the endzone tonight,” said Hall.

Brandon Becker scored two touchdowns for St. Charles – in fact, the first two of the game. His first saw him blast through two tackles on his way to a 23-yard touchdown in the first quarter. It capped a short three-play drive that began at the Rebel 36.

He’d add another in the second quarter, on a 1-yard reception – he was left alone in the endzone on a play action pass. That was set up by a sequence of five straight Marcus Hall runs that gained 41 yards in all. It made it 14-0 with 8:27 left in the half.

SCC opened its bag of tricks on the ensuing kickoff – the Comets recovered a surprise onside kick and immediately went back to work.

“It was something we’d seen on film,” said SCC coach Frank Monica. “We worked on it in practice. I wasn’t going to run it – I didn’t want to give them the momentum back. But the other coaches and the kids talked me into it.”

Six plays into the drive, Faucheux connected with Tyler Roussel on a third down, 41-yard touchdown pass.

The fourth score may well have been the backbreaker, After a pair of runs, SCC stepped up to its own 39-yard line with time running and less than 30 seconds left in the first half. A middle screen to Jeffrey Hall went to the house, a 61-yard score that made it 28-0.

“I thought that someone was right behind me,” said Hall. “But when I turned around I saw daylight.”

Monica said that with the running game struggling early – SCC gained only 11 yards on its first six carries – his offense turned to Faucheux and the passing game.

“We felt that we had to throw it,” said Monica. “He stepped up and made some really big plays. He’s getting better on a weekly basis.”

He would run for three second half scores, including a 55-yarder.

Riverside (4-3, 2-2) scored its only points on a 9-yard touchdown pass from Darnell Rachal to Austin Vicknair in the third quarter. That made it 34-7 with 1:15 left in the third. It capped a 58-yard, 10-play drive.

Rachal completed 6-of-10 passes for 65 yards. He was intercepted twice.

As importantly, St. Charles kept Rachal’s ability to break containment and run the football in check – he finished with minus eight yards rushing. Riverside finished with 88 yards on the ground, led by Thomas Crouch’s 25 yards on eight carries.

“It’s a really big win for us,” Becker said. “Coach stressed to us that these guys are our rivals and that it was important to win for our school. A lot of people see these games and it can help decide whether to go to one school or the other. It was real big for us, and fortunately we were able to pull it out.”