Staff photo / Brian Yauger South Range’s Tyler Remish breaks away from a Springfield tackler during the Raiders’ 37-7 romp over the visiting Tigers on Thursday at South Range High School.

BEAVER TOWNSHIP — South Range had a little bit of rust on the game’s opening drive, as rival Springfield made its way down the field.

The Raiders shook off the rust quickly, however, stalling that drive and putting together a few drives of their own in a 37-7 victory over the Tigers in both teams’ season opener Thursday.

Two of those drives were capped off by the connection of quarterback Billy Skripac and Shane Lindstrom. The first was a 77-yard score with Lindstrom bobbing and weaving through traffic and the second was a 50-yard strike.

“We have that capability,” Raiders coach Dan Yeagley said. “We had it last year, and those guys are back and have the ability to make things happen. Shane’s there. Shane can make things happen. He’s dynamic and Ayden (Leon) too and then we’ve got JD (Crouse). We had a nice trio going on tonight.

“Just proud of how they played together. They weren’t being selfish, they didn’t care who got the ball. They just wanted to make sure that they were blocking. … We’re there for each other and we’re starting to buy into that team atmosphere, which is super.”

One of the few major question marks on the South Range roster entering the year was on the offensive line. They had a few bodies to replace, but one game in, Yeagley is pretty excited with how the new players occupied those roles.

“Billy had time to throw, which was huge,” Yeagley said. “He was able to sit in the pocket and throw, which is huge. And if we have that kind of time, our guys can get open.”

Skripac went 7-of-9 on the evening, throwing for 201 yards and two scores, both to Lindstrom.

Blake Ewert was the team’s leading rusher with 60 yards on five carries and two scores of his own. Leading at receiver was Lindstrom, who had three receptions for a total of 128 yards.

The score that got the Raiders most excited however, was a 42-yard kick by Luke Starkey.

“He had some room to go, too,” Yeagley said. “He did a great job in the offseason to make himself better. He was already very good last year. He’s only a sophomore. Huge last year and this year, he developed his leg. It’s gotten stronger and he’s got some potential.”

Going into the game, the Tigers knew they were in for a scrap with South Range. While obviously not happy with the outcome, coach Sean Guerriero took a good amount of positives from his squad’s season-opener.

Kaesen Kosek led Springfield with 13 rushes for 38 yards and a touchdown.

“South Range is a great football team,” Guerriero said. “Dan does a great job, and he’s got those kids rolling right now. I told our kids going into this game that this is going to be a regional final championship-type game in Week 1 for us. We’re going to see where we stand.

“We did have a lot of positives, but we also had a lot of negatives and those negatives outweighed the positives. … But I’m proud of our kids.”

Springfield looks to get its first win of the season against Brookfield, who fell to Ursuline, 52-14.

Last year’s battle went down to the wire, so both teams are going to expect a street fight.

The Raiders hit the road to take on Hunting Valley University School. Due to not having stadium lights, the game against University School is set to start at 5 p.m.