What a difference a week makes.

Last Friday, Jim Thorpe came out flat at the start and trailed Panther Valley by 10 points at the half, but last night, the unbeaten Olympians hit high gear early and often in a 35-0 rout of Mahanoy Area."Getting a strong start was definitely an emphasis all week long," said Jim Thorpe head coach Mark Rosenberger. "We wanted to set the tone early as one of our goals and we accomplished that."After Robbie Heller returned the opening kickoff 38 yards to midfield, he took a hand-off from quarterback, Dean Richards and raced 20 more yards to the Bears' 30 yard line. On the very next play, Justin St. Hill got to the left edge and scampered 30 yards to pay dirt.After Thorpe stopped Mahanoy on a fourth down on its own 26, they scored again eight plays later on a nifty reverse to Robbie Geisinger who turned up field for a 45 yard TD."Our offense thrives on misdirection plays," said Rosenberger. Our bread and butter is our jet sweep and we have several backs who can bust big runs."In the second quarter, the Olympians put up two more touchdowns on runs from Heller, the area's leading rusher, who added another 114 yards to his season's total.Jim Thorpe (7-0) has made a habit this year of long touchdown runs. Last night, four of its scores came from 30, 45, 61, and 79 yards out-- and to make this statistic even more impressive, four different backs, St. Hill, Geisinger, Heller, and Antonio Madera each had a long TD run.'We like to get everyone involved," says Rosenberger. "And I want to add Kevin Vitti to the list. He carried with great effort to gain us some tough inside yards."Although his big play offense was electric, Rosenberger was most impressed with his defense that stopped two long Mahanoy drives. One drive was 11 plays and the other, a 16 play 74-yard, seven minute drive which the "Red Swarm" twice denied the goal line from inside their own five yard line."We played as a team. Their quarterback made good yardage, but we prevented any big plays which kept them off the board."Mahanoy (4-3) coach, Dave Holman was visibly upset after the game with his team's effort."They're an explosive team," said Holman, "But, our first-half tackling was terrible. And on offense, our quarterback, Matt Lewandowski had a good night running the ball, but we stopped ourselves on our two best drives. We just have to put the last two weeks behind us and get ready for the next game."Next up for the Olympians is North Schuylkill and Rosenberger knows what next week's focus will be."We have to be more physical against them," he said. "Last year, we were not, so after we watch film on Sunday, we'll devise a good game plan."GROUND SWELL ... The Olympians rolled up 403 rushing yards, many on jet sweeps and misdirection counters that averaged nearly 11 yards a carry.RARE AIR ... Six total passes were thrown in the game with only one completion, that by JT's Richards to Heller on a catch and run 23 yard middle screen that helped set up Geisinger's touchdown run.PINK FLAGS ... It was Pink Night at Olympian Stadium to acknowledge cancer awareness, and the officials tossed pink penalty flags, eight to be exact against the home team.THREE-PEAT ... This is the third year in a row that Jim Thorpe has won its first seven games. They are looking to stop the next pattern and that is losing the final three games of the season which occurred in the past two years.