COFFEEVILLE &8212; The Marengo High School Panthers escaped a catfight with the Coffeeville High School Panthers in their first road and region game Thursday night, 18-0.

While the final score tells a different story than the actual game, Marengo High School coach Scottie Jones said his team, who is now 2-0 on the season, faced a defensive showdown with their opponent and came out on top at the end of the game.

Jones said his group&8217;s struggles were largely attributed to the scouting job by Coffeeville coaches. He said his opponent&8217;s game plan shut down key aspects of the Panther offense.

Jones and his staff made several in-game adjustments to counteract the Coffeeville scheme. He said the group moved to some off tackle running, and he moved the team&8217;s tight end to fullback to match up against Coffeeville&8217;s size.

Going into the game, Jones noted the Coffeeville group seemed to run out of gas last week in their, 38-6, loss to A.L. Johnson High School. To seize the advantage for the Thursday game, he said he had his group running extra wind sprints during practice to make sure they too outlasted their opponent.

The conditioning edge showed up for Marengo in the form of 12 unanswered points in the fourth on the way to their, 18-0, shutout.

Jones&8217; group ended the game with 272 yards of total offense in the game, 260 of which came on the ground and 12 through the air with one completion for three attempts. Michael Watkins lead the way for the Marengo High Panthers, single-handedly amassing 162 of their yards rushing.