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photo by: Nick Henthorn

Wheeling ParkÀÏ˾»úÖ±²¥™s Brennan Wack takes the handoff from quarterback Jay Bordas in the first quarter at Wheeling Island Stadium during their Sept. 6 game against the visiting Spring Mills Cardinals. Wack set a single-game rushing record for Park against Musselman last Friday with 299 yards on the ground.

WHEELING — Just over two weeks ago, Wheeling Park’s Brennan Wack was set to step into the starting tailback role in his junior season for the Patriots, who were eager to see what he could do.

On Friday, Park got their answer.

The Wheeling Park Patriots raced past the Musselman Applemen 48-13 on the road Friday- and Wack raced past the record books. The junior set a new Patriot record for single-game rushing yards in the no-doubt victory which moved Park to 2-1.

Wack rushed 21 times for 299 yards against the Applemen. The record was previously set by Theo Blackston in 2014.

“He’s been off to a great start,” Park head coach Chris Daugherty said of the record-setting performance in an interview Saturday. “He’s over 500 yards across three games. He’s had an exceptional start to the season. Last night says a lot about our offensive line also. Those guys did a great job up-front to open some paths for him. He ran hard and made some really big runs out of what they did.”

Wheeling Park’s starters across the line vs. Musselman were Cameron Bryan, Hunter Means, Luke Miller, Kieran Moses and Liam Waldeck.

“I’m happy for that whole group because they work hard.”

Wack moved to the starting tailback position this season after spending time as an H-back and slot receiver in his sophomore campaign. His fast start has helped Park not skip a beat on the ground.

“Super pleased, but not shocked,” Daugherty said of Wack’s season. “He’s a kid who worked extremely hard this offseason. He had a great sophomore season, and he was going to be a big part of whatever position we played him in. The move to tail back, you could see pretty quickly that it was a good move for him personally and he was going to be able to do this at a pretty high level. It wasn’t shocking me to see him be so successful because he’s such a hard worker.”

Wack has 528 rushing yards in three games, averaging eight yards a carry, and averaged 14.24 yards a tote against Musselman. He scored four touchdowns against the Applemen and has six on the year.

“It’s not like his carries were in the 34-35 range,” Daugherty said. “I don’t know exactly what that yards per average is, but it’s pretty good. He also blocked a punt. He affected the game in a lot of different ways- he always does.”

Wheeling Park moves to 2-1 on the season. Wack’s titanic day, and the 35-point victory Friday, helped Park get back in the win column after a loss to Spring Mills the week before- a bleak game that included a thunderstorm and hour-long lighting delays before the game was called with a few minutes left in the third quarter. They will stay on the road next week, when they visit University (1-1).

“Any time you lose, it’s a long week,” Daugherty said. “You just want to get back to playing football and getting in the win column. Our kids handled this week very well because Musselman gave us a lot of different looks and they’re very unorthodox in what they do. Our guys had to be on top of their game mentally and stay the course. I thought our defense played very well.

“We just have to keep continuing to grow a little bit, and I think we did. We’ve gotten better from week one to week two and week two to week three. We’ve just got to continue that process.”