WARDSVILLE - It was an emphatic way to open the district playoffs.
The Blair Oaks Falcons attempted to score points in every way imaginable, and came pretty close to accomplishing that in Friday night's 70-0 win against the California Pintos in the first round of the Class 2 District 5 playoffs at the Falcon Athletic Complex.
"I felt like we were going to come out and play really good football tonight," Blair Oaks coach Ted LePage said. "We were executing on all facets. Our special teams were really good tonight, and that's where we really wanted to shore things up."
Blair Oaks opened the game with Nico Canale recovering a fumbled punt attempt by the Pintos. Four plays later, Marcus Edler ran a jet sweep to the right for a 12-yard touchdown run, giving Blair Oaks a 6-0 lead with 9:00 left in the opening quarter.
The Falcons scored on all seven possessions in the first half.
The next score came on a 7-yard pass from Nolan Hair to Braydan Pritchett with 5:50 still to play in the first quarter. On Blair Oaks' next offensive play, Hair connected on a 54-yard pass downfield to Ben Thomas for a touchdown, extending the lead to 20-0 with 3:29 left in the first.
Thomas had a punt return for a touchdown called back on a holding penalty. That would set up the Falcons' longest drive of the game.
Hair capped the 12-play, 65-yard drive with a 7-yard touchdown run early in the second quarter. Hair also scored on a 1-yard run on Blair Oaks' next possession, making the score 34-0 with 5:44 left in the first half.
Carson Prenger blocked a California punt, then picked up the loose ball and returned it 8 yards for a touchdown, giving Blair Oaks its first special teams touchdown of the season with 2:36 remaining in the half.
"The equalizer is special teams, and we had a special teams score tonight," LePage said. "That's always big."
Blair Oaks took possession of the ball again with less than a minute to play in the half and got another touchdown with its hurry-up offense. Hair completed a 24-yard pass to Edler, then threw a fade to Pritchett for a 17-yard touchdown pass with :35.2 left in the half to give the Falcons a 48-0 lead at halftime.
The touchdown pass to Pritchett gave Nolan Hair the school record for career passing yards. The previous record of 7,431 yards was set by Jordan Hair in 2015.
Nolan Hair had his third perfect passing performance in the past four games. He was 12-of-12 passing for 245 yards and four touchdowns, giving him 34 touchdown passes - which matches a school single-season record - and no interceptions in 10 games this season.
"It's exciting because he's so accurate," LePage said. "We could throw it a bunch, we could do a lot of things, but we're playing complete football."
Nolan Hair's fourth touchdown pass came on the second play of the second half. It was a 44-yard throw to Thomas, who broke a tackle at the 10-yard line, stumbled at the 5 and reached across the goal line before falling to the ground. That extended the lead to 55-0 with 10:34 left in the third quarter.
Riley Lentz followed with a 20-yard touchdown run, giving Blair Oaks a touchdown on nine straight possessions to start the game. The Falcons punted on their next possession late in the third, but they would soon capitalize on a well-placed punt at the California 3.
Rylee Niekamp tackled California quarterback Alex Currens in the end zone for a safety to open the final quarter. Jayden Purdy followed with an 18-yard touchdown run for the game's final touchdown with 7:27 to play.
Blair Oaks finished with 386 total yards of offense. Thomas caught four passes for 135 yards, Pritchett caught four passes for 56 yards and Edler caught three passes for 42 yards. Lentz and Levi Haney also caught passes for 12 and 10 yards, respectively.
Lentz led the rushing attack with 11 carries for 88 yards, while Purdy had four carries for 42 yards in the fourth quarter.
California (0-10) managed just 48 yards of total offense against the Falcons, one yard less than last Friday's performance.
"We changed the line of scrimmage from the defensive line," LePage said. " We did a great job of engaging and separating from blocks tonight, that maybe last week we weren't as efficient at that. The front played extremely well."
Blair Oaks (10-0), ranked No. 1 in Class 2, will host Father Tolton at 7 p.m. next Friday in the district semifinals. The Trailblazers (4-6), the No. 4 seed in district, began the postseason with a 59-20 win Friday against Hermann.
In other District 5 first-round games, second-seeded South Callaway edged past No. 7 Hallsville for a 28-27 win, while third-seeded North Callaway defeated No. 6 Montgomery County 22-20.
South Callaway (9-1) will host North Callaway (7-3) next Friday in the semifinals.