On the strength of touchdowns by tight ends, the Muhlenberg football team kicked off the 2023 season with a 53-12 win against Moravian.
 
The win was the 12th straight for the Mules against their Lehigh Valley rivals and kept the Sodexo Trophy in Allentown (photo by Caleb Williams, d3photography.com).
 
Senior tight ends James Nye and Matt McKenna shared the Bianco Award as the Mules' game MVPs after combining to catch seven passes for 164 yards and five touchdowns.
 
McKenna tied a school record for tight ends with three touchdown receptions, winding up in the end zone on each ball he caught. He's the third different Muhlenberg tight end with three TD catches in a game, all since 2019.
 
Nye recorded his third career 100-yard game, hauling in four passes for a career-high 117 yards and a pair of scores. He had the most receiving yards by a Mule player with fewer than five catches since 2011.
 
Tossing all five scoring strikes was junior Joe Repetti, who was 16-of-24 for 280 yards, surpassing 3,000 passing yards for his career. It was the fourth time in 12 career starts that Repetti threw at least five TD passes, and he was the first Muhlenberg quarterback since 2000 with five TD tosses in as few as 16 completions.
 
Moravian took the opening kickoff and went on a long drive, but the Mules defense stiffened and made a fourth-down stop from the 5-yard line. Muhlenberg needed only five plays to move 95 yards in the other direction, with Repetti's 58-yard pass to Nye putting the first points on the board.
 
On the second play of the second quarter, senior linebacker Matthew Giuliano picked off a pass over the middle for his first career interception. Two plays later, Repetti hit Nye again, this time from 19 yards out to make it 14-0.
 
After a punt by junior Joshua Castro was downed at the 2-yard line later in the quarter, the Greyhounds drove the length of the field for their first touchdown. They were within an extra point of closing to within 14-7, but senior Griffin Zobel blocked the kick, picked up the loose ball at the 10-yard line and ran 90 yards untouched for only the second defensive extra point in program history. The other one, also against Moravian, came in 2004.
 
Instead of 14-7, it was now 16-6, and the Mules took off from there, scoring the next 30 points to turn the game into a runaway. Three of the touchdowns came on passes from Repetti to McKenna, and the other on a 24-yard run by sophomore Matthew Manning. Muhlenberg also scored a safety when the snap on a Moravian punt attempt went through the end zone.
 
Freshman Tommy Donnelly ran 17 yards for a touchdown in the fourth quarter to close out the scoring.
 
The Mules racked up 496 yards of total offense, averaging 8.3 yards per play and 6.4 yards per rush. Senior Ian Csicsek had the best game of his career, rushing for a game-high 86 yards on only 10 carries.
 
The defense held Moravian to 45 rushing yards on 40 attempts, with 27 of those yards coming on the opening drive of the game.
 
Senior Tyler Ekstrom led the defense with 9 tackles, with Giuliano and senior Owen Kovacs adding 8 apiece. Junior Derek Graichen recorded a pair of tackles for loss, including a sack.
 
Zobel's blocked kick and return was one of several special teams highlights. Graduate student Alex Garrido and senior Nick Stannard combined to go 7-for-7 on extra points, and three different punters – Castro, Repetti and freshman Ayden Scharper – downed a punt inside the 20. Scharper also made a touchdown-saving tackle on a long kickoff return.   
 
The 53 points were the first scored by Muhlenberg in the first game of the season since 2017.