Motivation can come in many forms.

Maybe it's a newspaper clipping, maybe it's Homecoming. Maybe it's football alumni in the locker room before the game, talking about leaving one's mark. And maybe it's the team's tailback doing cartwheels and a front flip at a pep rally.

However Warwick's football players jump-started their incentive to beat Penn Manor Friday night, it worked big time.

The Warriors controlled both sides of the line of scrimmage and knocked the Comets from the ranks of the unbeaten with a thorough 27-7 victory in Lititz.

With the win, Warwick pulled even with Manor in Section One. Both are tied for second with 4-1 marks, one game behind section leader Wilson (5-0). The Comets host Wilson next Friday and Warwick hosts the Bulldogs on Oct. 31.

The Warriors' win was one-sided. These numbers tell the tale.

♦ Penn Manor finished with four yards rushing. That's four, on 19 carries.

♦ The Comets managed just five first downs - one in the second half - with two of the five coming on Warwick penalties.

♦ Warwick recorded 24 first downs.

♦ Two Warwick backs cracked the 100-yard plateau. Tailback Eric Resch rushed for 111 yards and three touchdowns and eclipsed 1,000 yards for the season for the second year in a row. Fullback Chris Schaffer rushed for 104 yards, 102 of them in the first half.

Anyway, you get the picture.

"Our offensive linemen had a little bit of a chip on their shoulder with the notion that nobody runs for more than 100 yards against (Penn Manor's) defense," said Warwick coach Bob Locker. "Penn Manor has a right to be proud of their defense because they (were) 7-0 but our kids took it as a challenge because we believe we can run."

The Warriors (6-2 overall) finished with 263 yards rushing against a Comet team that had allowed 93.7 per game prior to Friday night.

"They didn't (go past) Page 1 of their playbook," said Penn Manor coach Todd Mealy. "In every game they had played, they did done a ton of spread, four-wide, shotgun stuff but that wasn't in their game plan tonight. They didn't spread us out at all and they just gashed us."

Warwick took a 7-0 lead at the end of the first quarter on Resch's 2-yard scamper to the right side. It capped a 79-yard drive in which Warrior linemen Carson Geib, Brent Ober, Logan Gleason, Dan Martin and Sam Roman established their dominance up front.

"We've always been comfortable running against a 4-4 defense," said Geib, the left tackle who left the game with an injured right knee in the second half. "We worked on some little things this week that turned out to be key in this game."

Of the Comets' (7-1) first 15 offensive plays, six went for negative yardage but they did manage to tie the score on quarterback P.J. Rehm's 42-yard TD pass to Aaron Frederick.

But that was the lone offensive highlight for Manor. That play represented more than half of their yards gained in the game.

"We felt like we could roll right into them, right through the line and get to their quarterback and running backs," Ober said.

Warwick got another TD from Resch — the acrobat at the pep rally, by the way — which resulted in a 13-7 lead after a missed PAT. An onsides kick after that TD was successful and the Warriors turned it into Resch's third TD — and 17th of the season — for a 20-7 lead.

"The line did a fantastic job," Resch said. "We just kept pounding it down the field."

Warwick scored on its first possession of the third quarter with QB Randy Yost (4-for-5, 72 yards) finding Schaffer with a 23-yard TD toss. That drive also hogged half of the third quarter. Penn Manor ran only 12 plays in the second half.

"The defensive line did a good job keeping people off the 'backers, and let the 'backers flow," Locker said. "They played inspired football."

E-mail: kfreeman@lnpnews.com