By Mike London
mike.london@salisburypost.com

MOORESVILLE  — West Rowan head coach Louis Kraft groped for an explanation for a highly anticipated Friday night football game that turned into a dumpster fire, at least from a Falcon perspective.

Mooresville 66, West Rowan 0 was the scary final score from Coach Joe Popp Stadium. School records were set by the men from Mount Ulla — and they weren’t positive ones.

“An avalanche,” Kraft said, meaning it was even worse than a snowball, a series of unfortunate calamities that can happen as momentum starts rolling fast in one direction.

West had won a game four days earlier on the road, a solid, encouraging win at Davie. Mooresville had lost its previous game at Reagan. You never know.

Mooresville was favored to beat the Falcons in what is normally an entertaining non-conference matchup, but the magnitude of 66-0 was shocking.

Moving forward, the most pressing problem for the Falcons was the injury to quarterback Brant Graham. He didn’t absorb a violent hit, but he finished a play late in the first quarter — a Mooresville pick-six by AJ Graham that made it 21-0 — shaking his right arm and in obvious pain. Kraft said it was an injury to Graham’s throwing shoulder. The severity of that injury isn’t known yet.

While Brant Graham’s early departure definitely contributed to the onslaught that took place, Mooresville had established dominance at the line of scrimmage from the opening play. West has an excellent back in Jalen Neely, but every West running play was an automatic loss. Neely was getting hit 2 or 3 yards deep in the backfield.

“Had to play the jayvee quarterback (Jalen Moten) the rest of the way after Brant Graham went out,” Kraft said. “We really couldn’t throw and Mooresville knew it. The whole stadium knew it was over. If we’ve got Brant, they’re still going to put it on us because the Blue Devils are as good as advertised, but it would have been much more respectable if we had him.”

Mooresville not only overwhelmed the Falcons at the line of scrimmage, the Blue Devils showed blistering speed, especially on special teams. West boomed punts, but Mooresville had huge runbacks. West struggled to cover.

When West had to kick following a Mooresville safety, the Blue Devils promptly housed it, with Darian Reid rolling 73 yards.

It was 52-0 at halftime.

Eric Heal had three rushing touchdowns for Mooresville. Mooresville had 298 yards of offense. It would have been more but there were a lot of short-field touchdown drives.

Brant Graham was 1-for-4 passing for 10 yards before his injury. Neely netted 4 yards on 16 carries. As a team, the Falcons had minus-21 rushing yards.

Mooresville’s 66 points were the most ever allowed by the Falcons. The 66-0 score also was the most lopsided margin of defeat in West’s football history.

“We’ve got a bye week to regroup and then we’ve got Carson and South Rowan and a chance to get some momentum back,” Kraft said. “What happened at Mooresville wasn’t ideal, but we’re not dead yet.”