Pottsville’s defense thought it had Eli Zimmerman penned in for a loss.

Just like that, the Northwestern Lehigh senior running back was gone.

If there was a play that defined the Tigers’ 35-0 victory over the Crimson Tide in a Schuylkill/Colonial Red Division clash Friday at Tiger Stadium, it came with 4:48 left in the first quarter.

Zimmerman took a pitch left and was nearly surrounded by three Pottsville defenders as he got to the corner. He slipped one tackle, spun around another and ran past the third, dancing and then sprinting down the sideline for a 66-yard touchdown that put the unbeaten Tigers in firm control.

It was one of several big plays Zimmerman made Friday, as he rushed for 163 yards and three touchdowns, excelled on several kick and punt returns and had a shutout-preserving interception in the fourth quarter as the Tigers (7-0, 6-0 Red) remained unbeaten.

“Eli is the type of kid where if the blocking scheme breaks down, there’s a miss or the defense guesses right, he’s got that electric ability and elusiveness,” Northwestern Lehigh coach Josh Snyder said of his senior leader. “He’s got a low center of gravity, he’s a physical runner and he can make people miss in a phone booth. You saw that tonight. We’ve seen it on a weekly basis.

“He can make your team look really good on certain plays where it necessarily shouldn’t.”

The game took a wrong turn for Pottsville just four plays into the contest when leading rusher JuJu Bainbridge hobbled off with an ankle injury. He didn’t return.

Bainbridge had ripped off a pair of 11-yard runs to jump-start the Tide’s first possession, but Pottsville’s offense ground to a halt without the junior tailback.

Pottsville (3-4, 3-3 Red) finished the night with just 24 yards rushing on 22 carries, 111 total yards and seven first downs. Without Bainbridge, the Tide rushed 20 times for 2 yards.

“He ran the ball well when he was in there,” Pottsville coach Mike Brennan said of Bainbridge. “(Losing him) certainly hurt us.

“Our kids battled; our kids fought. That’s a good football team … we knew that coming in. We wanted to see where we were and we found out. It’s disappointing for our kids, because we had a great week of practice.

“I’m proud of our kids for battling and fighting. We have to get ourselves healthy moving forward.”

Northwestern Lehigh scored on its first two possessions to quickly lead 14-0, then added two more scores in the second quarter to take a 27-0 advantage into intermission.

A 14-yard run by Zimmerman and a 47-yard pass from Shane Leh to Landen Matson set up the Tigers’ first score, a 10-yard TD run by Zimmerman.

Pottsville countered with a 45-yard pass from Andrew Allen to Tsirell Curry to get into Northwestern territory, but the Tide turned the ball over on downs at the Tigers’ 34 after Zimmerman knocked down a pass on fourth down.

One play later, Zimmerman was back in the end zone and Northwestern was up 14-0.

“When I got the ball, I saw two guys,” Zimmerman said of the touchdown run. “Mason Bollinger had a huge block kicking the guy in. I had to make one guy miss and I did. The rest is history.”

Pottsville struggled to find any consistency and rhythm the entire night against the much bigger, much more physical Northwestern defense. The Tigers’ front line of Bryer Reichard, Jared Meck and Jackson Huber constantly gained penetration, while linebacker Shane Hulmes made several big plays.

The Tide had one legitimate scoring chance in the first half after Curry returned an interception to the Tigers’ 11-yard line. But a bad snap, two tackles for loss by Reichard and a procedure penalty moved the ball back to the 27, and Pottsville was unable convert on fourth down.

Northwestern went up 21-0 on a 50-yard pass from Leh to Matson, then took a 27-0 lead on a 3-yard run by Mason Bollinger.

The Tigers evoked a running clock on their first possession of the third quarter, going 56 yards in three plays. Zimmerman’s 13-yard TD run and a two-point conversion pass from Leh to Joshua Wambold upped the margin to 35-0 and neither team got close to the end zone the rest of the way as fog engulfed the complex.

The Tigers finished with 244 yards rushing and 400 yards of total offense, while their defense pitched its second shutout. On the season, Northwestern Lehigh has outscored its seven opponents 314-36.

“Our defense is really tough,” Snyder said. “They’re really solid at all three levels. Bryar Reichard started to dominate at times, then sort of took over the game.

“Our 3-0 front line is a nightmare for opposing offenses. They’re tough, they’re physical, they’re big, they’re tough to move. Our linebackers aren’t too shabby either, and we got some good guys on the back end. You’re not giving the offense a whole lot of options that way and we can be aggressive.”

For Pottsville, the loss was demoralizing, for the most part due to the Bainbridge injury. But the Tide hurt itself on several occasions with dropped passes, missed tackles and mental mistakes that Brennan said they’ll work on in preparation for next Friday’s game at home against Wilson Area.

“We have to be clean. We have to take care of the ball,” Brennan said. “We weren’t as clean as we needed to be. We have to learn from it and move forward, become a better football team.”

N’western 35, Pottsville 0

Pottsville 0 0 0 0 - 0

N’western 14 13 8 0 - 35

NW - Zimmerman 10 run (Kern kick)

NW - Zimmerman 66 run (Kern kick)

NW - Matson 50 pass from Leh (Kern kick)

NW - Bollinger 3 run (kick failed)

NW - Zimmerman 13 run (Wambold pass from Leh)