By: Jonathan Szczepaniak | St. Clair Shores Sentinel | Published September 15, 2023
ST. CLAIR SHORES — When St. Clair Shores Lake Shore opened its 2023-2024 football campaign on Aug. 25 traveling to Sault Ste. Marie, it was an unconventional start to the year for the team and different from seasons past.
It was a different area, a different opponent and, more importantly, a different kind of travel for the Shorians.
Sure, the 49-0 loss wasn’t the outcome Lake Shore had hoped for when making the hike, but coach Marcus Cribbs said the season opener played a pivotal role in other aspects of the team.
“I think the Sault Ste. Marie trip, just overall the travel and playing that level of competition, I think that really helped us grow as a team even with the loss,” Cribbs said. “Coming back down, we knew some things we needed to work on, and we’ve really been working on those things over the last couple of weeks that’s led to the two wins we’ve had.”
Now two weeks later, Lake Shore is 2-1 and fresh off a 32-21 win over Macomb Area Conference Gold opponent Warren Woods Tower on Sept. 8 at Lake Shore High School.
Tower took a 15-14 lead at the half, but the Lake Shore offense came out firing on all cylinders in the second half behind junior quarterback Jordan Alston.
Alston had connected with junior wide receiver Cam’Ron Flowers, who’s more of a Swiss army knife in the Lake Shore offense, and junior wide receiver Ja’Sean Dean in the first half for a pair of passing touchdowns, but Alston wasn’t done giving the Tower secondary problems just yet.
On Lake Shore’s first drive of the second half, Alston found Flowers on a 46-yard touchdown pass to give Lake Shore the lead.
A dynamic playmaker at the quarterback position, Alston has continued to improve throughout the past three weeks, and Cribbs said Alston is only getting more confident in the pocket.
“This game was probably one of his better games of his career here at Lake Shore in terms of yardage, touchdown passes, and just putting it all together,” Cribbs said. “It’s really the first game where we kind of put the trust in him to read the defense and sling it a little bit more than we normally do.”
Alston finished the day with 278 yards passing and three touchdowns while Flowers hauled in 127 receiving yards and two touchdowns.
The Lake Shore defense would hold the Tower offense on the ensuing drive, and senior Michael Livi would punch in a three-yard touchdown run to give Lake Shore the two-score lead.
Senior defensive lineman Keith Reeves led the defensive unit with eight tackles and three tackles for a loss, while senior defensive tackle James Brown tallied seven tackles and three tackles for a loss. Junior defensive back Zachary Senter had an interception in the win.
Lake Shore’s improvement has been its balanced play on both sides of the field, averaging 22 points per game offensively and allowing just over 13 points per game.
The Shorians will look to continue their impressive play on Sept. 15 when they face a winless Warren Fitzgerald squad at Fitzgerald High School to continue their five-week stretch of league opponents.