GROVE CITY — For Moniteau and Grove City, Friday night's high school football game at Forker Field gave both teams an opportunity to warm up for the upcoming playoffs.

Grove City will enter the District 10 Class AAA playoffs, while the Warriors will make their way into the District 9 Class AA playoffs. Moniteau finished as the third seed in the D-9 playoffs behind top-seeded Karns City and runner-up Brockway.

When the final seconds clicked off the clock Friday, the regular season came to an end for both teams as the Eagles soared to a 33-6 win over the Warriors.

"I felt the outcome of this game was a combination of things," said Moniteau coach Jeff Campbell. "They are a good football team and they came out and played well, and we came out, especially defensively, and didn't play well.

"We put the ball on the ground and we didn't catch passes. We didn't do the things that we have been doing to win football games," he added.

The Warriors struck first when they took the opening kickoff and marched 61 yards on seven plays before quarterback Kyle Armagost hooked up with Zach Wheeler for a 22-yard scoring play to give Moniteau a 6-0 lead.

"(Armagost) is a tough little quarterback, and that (James Shope) is a good runner," said Grove City coach Jeff Bell. "But our kids did a good job against them after the opening drive."

Following the Moniteau score, the Eagles set the tone for the rest of the night as they answered the Warriors with a touchdown of their own.

Operating from their own 30, the Eagles needed only seven plays to go the distance, Marty Phipps ripping his way into the end zone from 11 yards out for the score. Tyler Dagres tacked on the PAT to give GC the lead for keeps at 7-6.

While Campbell was disappointed, Bell liked what he saw from his troops.

"The kids played a great game tonight," Bell said. "Both of my offensive and defensive coordinators did a heckuva job. That first drive was one of the best drives we had all year, and when you get scored on quick like that, you never know what is going to happen.

"But when you answer right back, that is a good sign and we needed to do that at that point of the game," he added.

With Moniteau driving for a possible go-ahead score, Armagost had his pocket picked by Marty Phipps in the Eagles end zone. Twelve plays later, Phipps' brother, Wes, went in from 7 yards out for the score.

On the first play following the Phipps touchdown, the Warriors found themselves with more trouble as they coughed up the ball on their own 43. Six plays later, Wes Phipps scored his second TD from a yard out.

The PAT was no good, but the Eagles took a comfortable 20-6 lead into the locker room at the break.

"Turnovers kill you," said Campbell. "I stress all the time that you cannot beat yourself; you have to make the other team beat you. We beat ourselves with turnovers and missed tackles, and if we expect to win next week, we can't do that."

Bell agreed that the turnovers were a big factor in leading his team to the win.

"We have talked a lot about that the past few weeks and we have been doing a good job of taking care of the football," said Bell. "Last week we had a penalty problem, but tonight we did a good job of eliminating many of those mistakes. Hopefully, we can take this same thing into next week and build on it."

Coming out of District 10 Region 5 as the champion, the Eagles will face Erie Strong Vincent next weekend in the opening round of the D-10 playoffs.

As for Moniteau, the Warriors face a tough draw in Brockway at 1 p.m. Nov. 14 at Clarion University in the opening round of the District 9-AA tournament.