Falling behind 35-0 at halftime against St. Clair’s Bulldogs inside Bearcat Memorial Stadium, Jed Leeper’s Hermann Bearcat football team kept playing hard in the second half in spite of a running clock to start it.

Down 42-0 late in the third quarter, Herman quarterback Kohlt Witthaus hooked up with Carter Humphrey on a 23-yard touchdown pass play getting the Bearcats on the board.

Roman Martin’s extra point cut St. Clair’s lead to 35-7 with :28 for the third quarter.

A Witthaus 1-yard TD run with 3:37 left in the fourth quarter stopped the running clock making the score 42-14 after Martin’s second extra point of the night.

Falling 42-14, Hermann will travel to Pacific for Four Rivers Conference (FRC) football action this Friday night with a 7 p.m., kickoff.

Adding to his rushing touchdown, Witthaus was 11-17 through the air with 144 yards passing.

Tayven Hopkins led Bearcat receivers with seven catches for 81 yards.

Humphrey had two catches for 46 yards while Kyle Koch had a reception for 15 yards.

Witthaus also paced Hermann on the ground with 45 yards rushing on 11 carries while Trent Chasteen ran the ball 11 times for 25 yards.

Defensively, Koch had Hermann’s lone interception while Hopkins and Ashton Rucker each had a fumble recovery.

In the tackling department, Aiden Eikermann paced the blue and white with nine total tackles while Hopkins was close behind with eight stops.

Witthaus added six tackles to go with five from Rucker.

Humphrey added four total tackles to go along with three stops from the Hermann trio of Cole Brinker, Corbin Sadler and Chasteen.

Sawyer Moore and Koch also added a pair of tackles.