News Photo by Jonny Zawacki Alpena tight end Colt Gray (45) catches a pass and tries to elude a Marquette defender during the first quarter of the Wildcats’ season-opening game at Marquette on Thursday.

MARQUETTE — The lengthy drive seemed a bit longer on the way back home for the Alpena High football team after a season-opening 49-14 loss to Marquette on Thursday.

Despite falling behind by two scores early, the Wildcats had opportunities to cut into the lead.

Alpena put together a 13-play drive with a good mix of run and pass, but the drive stalled out on the Redmen four yard line.

After forcing a turnover on downs, Marquette gained more momentum as Alpena was unable to solve Redmen senior quarterback Austin Ridl who started his stellar night by connecting with David Eberhard down the sidelines that went for 93 yards.

A play later, Dustin Lohfink finished the quick drive with a three yard touchdown to put the Redmen up 20-0.

“We knew that Marquette had speed and they are talented, we needed to tackle and limit big plays and we didn’tt do that tonight,” Alpena coach Eric Mitchell said. 

The Wildcats were forced to punt on their next possession and once again, Ridl and the Redmen were quick to strike as Ridl raced 64 yards to the end zone.

Alpena had another chance to crack the scoreboard before the half, but once again had a lengthy drive of 12 plays stall out at the Marquette 10 yard line.

The Wildcats trailed 27-0 at halftime.

“We talked all week about getting into the red zone and being able to finish off drives and score. We failed to score and then allowed them to hit big plays and that was a dagger,” Mitchell said. “We had good things going, but we just couldn’t get rolling. It was an effort thing tonight, we had guys taking plays off and our effort just wasn’t there and that was the most disheartening thing about tonight.”

The Redmen kept rolling, scoring 10 seconds into the third quarter when Ridl threw a screen pass to Jordan DeMay for a 52 yard score to extend Marquette’s lead to 35-0.

Ridl was stellar in the three quarters he played as he accounted for four touchdowns, three through the air and one on the ground. Ridl ran twice for 90 yards and a score and was 9-of-10 passing for 215 yards and three touchdowns.

The Redmen added two more scores in the quarter: Ridl’s final touchdown of the night and DeMay picked off a Jake Zann pass and went 42 yards the other way to give Marquette a 49-0 lead.

Alpena finally finished off two drives at the end of the game and scored twice before the final whistle.

Jason Smolinski scored Alpena’s first touchdown of the year with a 10-yard rushing score early in the fourth quarter.

With 26 seconds left, Zann found Mason Mumford in the corner of the end zone for a 13-yard completion.

Smolinski finished the game with 87 yards and a touchdown on 16 carries. Zann was 16-of-25 passing for 162 yards with a touchdown and an interception.

“We finished strong, which was good after a bad start. It’s good to finish strong, but we have to be able to start better,” Mitchell said. “We have to come out and be ready to play and all of us need to get better in every aspect of the game from coaching, to offense, defense and special teams. We have to get better.”

Alpena hosts Cheboygan Thursday in their home opener at Park Family Field at Wildcat Stadium.