NEW CASTLE - There are certain indelible facts about football that can't be ignored.

If you can't protect the quarterback, you'll lose.

If you commit costly penalties, you'll lose.

If you turn the ball over, you'll lose.

They may be cliches, but they are truisms that every coach worth his weight in whistles knows, and the Mars High School football team found out just how true those truisms are in a 33-14 road loss against Laurel Friday night.

Mars quarterback D.J. Cannon was pounded all evening, sacked four times and constantly harassed.

The Planets (1-3, 1-1) also had 50 yards in penalties and committed five turnovers.

"You can't turn the ball over five times, especially against a team like that," said Mars coach Scott Heinauer. "We kept shooting ourselves in the foot, and you can't do that."

Mars looked good for the first eight minutes of the game, taking the opening kickoff and marching steadily to the Laurel 16. That's when things started to go bad.

The Planets lost five yards on a motion penalty, another 15 on a holding penalty and then three more on a loss on a running play.

That set up a third-and-33.

There is no play in the playbook for a third-and-33.

"We had the ball for eight minutes and didn't get any points," Heinauer said. "I thought we needed to score, 3, 7, something on that drive."

Instead, Cannon launched a long pass that was intercepted at the Laurel 5.

The Spartans (3-1, 1-1) went three-and-out and punted, but forced the first of four first-half turnovers on the return to set up a 55-yard scoring drive culminated by an 8-yard run by Laurel quarterback Corey Campbell.

Laurel coach Jerry Holzhauser didn't lose sight of the significance of the early chain of events.

"Who knows what happens (if Mars scores on its first drive)?" Holzhauser asked. "It's funny how the complexion of a game can change on something like that."

Mars turned the ball over on its next two possessions and Laurel capitalized with two more rushing touchdowns by Collins to give the Spartans a 20-0 edge at the half.

Collins was particularly damaging to Mars the entire game, both throwing and running.

The junior, who was a wide receiver last year, rushed for 64 yards in the first half and scored all three touchdowns. He finished with 96 yards rushing and 51 yards passing.

Collins called all of the offensive plays for Laurel.

"I gave him some formations, but he called all the plays," Holzhauser said. "You can do it with a kid like him. He's out there on the field and can see the defense better than I can on the sideline."

Mars tried to climb back into the game early in the third quarter when Paul Ferrese took a pitch and scampered around left end for a 57-yard touchdown run to cut the lead to 20-6.

Ferrese rushed for 129 yards on 17 carries.

But Laurel responded with a nine play, 53-yard drive as Brett Kerr scored on a 5-yard run to build the lead back to 26-6 early in the fourth quarter.

Meanwhile, the Spartans' defense was teeing off against Cannon, who had little time to throw.

Cannon was 4-of-16 for 43 yards and three interceptions.

"We missed some blocking assignments up front," Heinauer said.

Holzhauser made it a priority not to give Cannon time in the pocket or on the short rollouts Mars uses to get their quarterback set in the passing game.

"We knew that kid was tough," Holzhauser said. "We hit him and hit him hard and he popped right back up."

Holzhauser said he was never comfortable with the lead his team had built.

"We got up 14-0, but I never felt that was enough," he said. "Mars is a team that can score from anywhere on the field."

For Mars, this was a chance to assert itself at the top of the Tri-County North. Instead, the Planets have some work to do.

"You just have to put this behind you," Heinauer said. "You have to move on to the next level and come out and play football. We've dug a little hole for us."