Long Reach football coach Pete Hughes likes to get his money's worth. The rules say he has four downs to get 10 yards and darn it, he's going to use all four.

Twice in the fourth quarter of Friday night's 32-21 win over visiting Glenelg, Hughes' Lightning went for it on fourth-and-long and came up big both times.

Both teams were having trouble stopping each other's offenses in the first half. Glenelg backs Shannon Maura and sophomore Colin Osbourne combined for more than 180 yards and two touchdowns as Maura ripped into the Lightning secondary for big-play gains of 33, 22 and 14 yards.

"Shannon played a great game. He's a little man but he plays big. He's strong and real quick," said Glenelg linebacker Tyler Brittain, who also scored a first-half touchdown.

Osbourne had five carries of at least 10 yards in the first half.

The Lightning were running the ball well themselves, as 300-pound tackles Mike Franklin and Aaron Dailey opened lanes for Javaugh Walker and Kwasi Sarpong each scored first-half touchdowns.

"We felt all night that we could move the ball at anytime. ... It's just that we couldn't stop them," Hughes said.

With kicker John Stifler on crutches with a sprained ankle, Long Reach missed both its extra-point attempts and trailed Glenelg, 21-12, at halftime. But in the second half, both teams adjusted on defense to stuff the run. Osbourne, who ran for 92 yards in the first half, mustered only nine in the second. Long Reach struggled too, as Sarpong found only 16 second-half yards.

The two defenses appeared to be battling to a stalemate until junior transfer Rashon Sanders broke open a 17-yard touchdown scramble to close the Lightning deficit to three late in the third quarter.

"We stayed as a team, we stayed as a family, we didn't let anything get between us," said Walker, who continued to run effectively into the fourth quarter, gaining 47 second-half yards.

Still, the Glenelg defense held strong, forcing Long Reach into a fourth-and-11 jam on the Glenelg 27-yard line on its first drive of the final quarter. With Stifler out of commission, the Lightning decided their best bet was to go for the first down.

"We felt like the way we were playing defense we could go for it and (if we didn't convert) still keep them down at that end," said Hughes, whose team outscored Glenelg, 20-0, in the second half.

Two plays earlier, Long Reach had failed on a pass play for sophomore quarterback Dajon Modeste. On a fourth-and-long, they tried it again.

"We just missed it the first time," Hughes said. "We just told (Modeste) to concentrate and throw a better pass, and he did; he threw a dart."

The dart hit its target -- a diving Pat Blackmon -- who landed on the 1-yard line with the ball in his hands. Walker punched it in from there, and Long Reach had its first lead of the game with just over six minutes left.

On Glenelg's ensuing drive, Joey Montag intercepted a pass that bounced off a Glenelg receiver's chest, giving the Lightning a chance to put the game away.

That's when Glenelg mounted a defensive stand that nearly gave the Gladiators one last drive for victory. On third-and-goal from the 9, the Glenelg front stuffed Long Reach for a 1-yard gain and another fourth-and-long situation. This time, sophomore fullback Scott Korzeniowski charged through the middle for a back-breaking touchdown with just over a minute left.

"We played strong down on the goal line," Brittain said. "A big stop on third down is a big uplift. But that (fourth-down conversion) just takes the momentum straight out of you."

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