It was Week 2 of the 2016 season. The previous week, an outstanding performance by Godfrey Onyeka, the subject of the September 2026 Golden Moments, led Laurier to a 37- 18 victory over Queen's. 

Now, it was a Saturday evening home opener against the York Lions. 

Nothing much happened in the first quarter of that game. In fact, at the end of the opening frame, York led 3-1. As well, on the team's three possessions in that quarter (and on its first possession of the second quarter), Laurier had only 42 yards of offence (including 33 yards rushing), three punts, and one missed field goal. 

However, after that, the Laurier ground game had the second-best rushing performances in OUA history, leading the team to a 74-3 victory.

But before I tell you the story of that day, I want to at first acknowledge an even GREATER rushing performance. 

The OUA record for most rushing yards in a game is actually 637 yards, and that was achieved by the 1974 Golden Hawks in a 90-15 victory over York. 

That team was coached by Tuffy Knight, and the offence was famous for running the option. 

According to Gary Jeffries, it was basically just "option left, option right" that day. He told me that 14 different guys would've played O-Line during the game. Those former players are Rich Griffiths, Doug Smith, Mike Sitko, Dave Yurincich, Ken Pelissero, Ed Dietrich, Peter Walker, Doug Bestard, Bill Burkhart, John Glaves, Martin Cook, Larry Hale, Rick Pedersen, and Heinz Plauman. 

By doing a deep dive into the archives of The Cord, I was able to find some information from that game. Only 34 players dressed for each team that day, and the score at halftime was only 32-15. Chuck McMann rushed for 220 yards and five touchdowns, including runs of 37, 32, and 35 yards. 

Rick Chalupka had 141 yards and two touchdowns, including a 39-yard run. 

The team scored a total of 12 touchdowns on that day, and 7 different players scored, including Rick Haswell, Tom Dewey, Mike Weiler, John Wintermeyer, and Gord Taylor.  

To honour that group, though, here's a link to the game day program from that season, which lists the entire roster and coaching staff.

      

Going back to that September day in 2016, Laurier rushed for 575 yards on 59 carries. That's an average of 9.7 yards per carry. 

Eric Guiltinan had 18 carries for 180 yards and two touchdowns in just his second career start; Levondre Gordon had eight carries for 115 yards and two touchdowns; Osayi Iginuan had eight carries for 110 yards and one touchdown; Elijah Fera had 10 carries for 69 yards and 1 touchdown; Tre Nicholson had four carries for 44 yards, and Darian Waite had six carries for 30 yards. 

A few others combined for an additional 29 yards on the ground.  

Daniel Bennett and Josh Perez both caught touchdown passes, Carson Oulette had a punt return for a touchdown, and Malcolm Thompson had a 70-yard pick-six. 

Now, we all know that skill players usually get all the publicity. Well, the majority of this submission is going to be about the guys that made all that success possible: the offensive line.

At that time, Irv Daymond was the offensive-line coach for Laurier, and his assistant was our current offensive line coach and run game coordinator, Zach Scotto. The offensive linemen that opened up massive holes all day for the Golden Hawks were Jamie Lalonde, Marcus Nese, Ed Cadougan, Chris Reddy, Sam Adams, JD Richardson, and Drew Marleitner.

ZACH SCOTTO: We felt good about the running game. The O-Line was coming together and meshing well. 

We knew we were going to run the ball a lot and take limited shots downfield (with a new QB).  

We started popping off multiple "ten-plus yarders" one after another. 

EG (Eric Guiltinan) took over in the second quarter. He had over 180 yards on 12 carries, and that was all in the first half, but that was the game he blew out his ACL, and we lost him for the rest of the year. 

Dre (Levondre Gordon) and Osayi both went for over 100 yards. We dressed seven linemen that day. When our starting QB came out, we put in our two backup O-Linemen. Our fullbacks Mario Villamizar and Stu Smith really contributed to our success that day.

MARCUS NESE: One thing that really stands out for me is just remembering the pure exhaustion! I don't think we expected to come out and run for that many yards. 

As you know, in football, once you get up to a big lead, the only thing you can really do is keep the ball on the ground. It was a pretty rewarding day. 

We ended up leading the nation in rushing yardage that year too. That game really set the tone for our identity for the whole season. 

We really took York's will away that day. You could see it in the eyes of their defensive linemen. Three of our backs rushed for over 100 yards, and one of them, Eric Guiltinan, almost rushed for 200 in the first half alone! 

It was also cool to see OVFL legend Eli Fera getting a rushing touchdown that day too. He had suffered a terrible injury prior to his freshman year, and seeing him battle back and score his first TD that day was a big thing for all of us. 

He was a great locker room guy and a great teammate. I remember the day after the game, our offensive coordinator Mark Surya bought the whole O-Line pizza, which is just what a group of slow, fat kids needed! 

Crazy to look at the stat line that game and see Kurleigh Gittens Jr. had only one reception. My only regret is not asking Surya to give me a carry in the fourth quarter!

ED CADOUGHAN: That game was special! I remember we had three running backs rush for over 100 yards and one of them, Eric Guiltinan, rushed for almost 200. 

For the O-Line, starting in the second quarter, it felt like every single time we ran the ball, we were getting 10 yards or more. There was no stopping us, not just that game, but all year! 

We really dominated and led the nation in rushing yardage. This wasn't a highly touted O-Line. We weren't as big in stature as many of the offensive lines on other teams like Western, but we were very tough and athletic. 

Coach Irv's motto was "CRAM". We wanted to run the ball every single play. We truly felt like nobody could stop us. 

We felt practice was harder than the games because we were going up against what I felt was the best defence in the nation. It was loaded with tremendous defensive linemen such as Kwaku Boateng, Jalen Price, Trevaughan James, Rashari Henry, Emerson Gourdet, and Robbie Smith.