WALES – Dalton Eldridge didn’t have time to be nervous.

A sophomore running back who played with the freshman squad last year, and who was likely penciled into the junior varsity roster this fall, gave the Gardiner Area High School coaching staff plenty to think about Saturday afternoon after being forced into his first significant varsity action.

Eldridge carried the ball a game-high 16 times for 74 yards and two touchdowns over the final three quarters to lead his Tigers to a convincing 32-6 win over the Oak Hill Raiders.

“I thought I was just going to get a few touches here and there,” Eldridge said. “I was a little nervous at first, but it kind of came to me after a while. As long as you feel like you belong, it’s going to be fine.”

Starting running back Forest Chadwick, who figured to be a prominent piece of Gardiner’s Class B state title defense, scored on a 59-yard run midway through the first quarter – and never touched the ball again.

“He’s got a fracture in his finger and he tweaked his Achilles a little bit,” Gardiner coach Jim Palmer said. “We figured we’d get him out of there and get some young guys running.”

Eldridge, meanwhile, earned his first touch on a third-and-goal situation early in the second quarter. He scored, putting his team on top, 19-6.

“I just trusted the linemen and followed them,” Chadwick said. “They couldn’t have done any better.”

The rest of the Tigers’ running corps picked up the slack, too, gaining a collective 213 yards after Chadwick left the game with 70.

“We like to be able to have four or five backs back there who can carry the ball,” Palmer said. “(Pete) Caradonna, (Michael) Phelps, (Tyler) Hall, (Dylan) Hensbee, we kind of taking pride giving guys reps during the week, so we can interchange guys if we need to to get carries and rest guys.”

The Raiders just couldn’t stop them, no matter which back took the handoff.

“That’s their program,” Oak Hill coach Bruce Nicholas said. “They’re the defending state champs, and if someone goes down, another one is going to go in and do a good job, as you can see.”

Perhaps equally impressive in Gardiner’s debut Saturday was the play of its defense, which allowed Oak Hill just 33 net rushing yards, and just 59 yards of net offense all together.

“They were getting too much penetration with their linebackers inside,” Nicholas said. “We run an offense where we pull our guards a lot, and they were blitzing to those areas and we couldn’t pick those up.”

Chadwick’s touchdown in the first gave the Tigers a 7-0 lead.

The Raiders’ Tim Blais picked off a short pass in the flat on the Tigers’ next possession and raced 37 yards for the score to pull Oak Hill within one, but Jake Wright returned the ensuing kickoff 89 yards for the Tigers, putting them back ahead by seven.

Eldridge’s three-yard plunge in the second made the score 19-6, a seven-yard off-tackle run early in the fourth made it 25-6, and Pete Caradonna, who also 45 yards on 12 carries on offense, returned an interception for a touchdown on Oak Hill’s next possession to salt the game away.