GROVE CITY — Meadville football coach Ray Collins received the best birthday present he could have ever imagined Friday night: a Region 5 championship.

Collins, who turns 50 on Sunday, led his team to a resounding 48-14 victory over Grove City at Forker Field in what amounted to a region championship game. Both teams entered play with identical 5-0 records in Region 5 play.

Its win marks Meadville's first championship in 26 years.

“I told the team before the game that there hasn't been a championship in Meadville since 1990,” Collins said. “If you come to play tonight, you will always be known as champions and they came out and played a great game.”

Both the Eagles and the Bulldogs came into the conteste averaging over 48 points per game on the season, but it was the quickness and speed of the Meadville running game that made the difference.

“They flat-out played better than we did,” Grove City coach Sam Mowrey said. “They did a good job defensively and we just couldn't adjust to the speed they have.”

Meadville jumped out early against the Eagles and never looked back. Journey Brown scored the first of his four touchdowns on the first play from scrimmage as he raced 59 yards for a score to give the Bulldogs the early 7-0 advantage.

Brown, who had a game-high 198 yards rushing, also scored on runs of 35 and three yards in the first quarter, while Isaiah Manning chipped in with a 15-yard touchdown run, as Meadville took a commanding 27-0 lead in the opening period.

Manning had 195 yards rushing for the game as the Bulldogs amassed 422 yards on the ground. The running game was so strong for Meadville that quarterback Kirk Mamau did not even attempt a pass in the game.

“We play old-school football.” Collins said. “We have three strong running backs, so teams can't key on just one guy.”

Trey Adams led the way on the ground for Grove City with 79 yards, while Logan Lutz had 85 yards receiving. Kameron Patterson completed 13 of 23 passes for 122 yards in the losing effort.

The Eagles did manage to score two second half touchdowns on runs by Cordell Sanders and Trey Adams

“We are still 8-1,” Mowrey said. “We got our bad game out of the way. We can't dwell on it.”