Three short fields started one long night.

That was the story for the Mars football team.

Mars gave a team as potent as Hopewell spectacular field position on its opening three drives and, as a result, didn't stay in the game for very long.

The Post-Gazette No. 2-ranked WPIAL Class AAA team, Hopewell (2-0), capitalized early and rolled to a 47-22 win against visiting Mars (1-1) at Tony Dorsett Stadium.

Hopewell sprung to a 20-0 lead after its first three drives -- and only needed a total of 58 yards to do so, getting handed tremendous field position on two solid punt returns and an interception.

From there, Mars was simply never in it.

"What can you say? You just can't do that," Mars coach Scott Heinauer said. "When you have a team like Hopewell, and they are that good, you make some mistakes and they are going to make you pay; it is just that simple. You do those things, you are going to pay for it."

The person who made the Planets pay most was sophomore running back Rushel Shell, who ran for 171 yards and four touchdowns on 24 carries. Shell gained all those yards despite just one fourth-quarter carry.

"He's a great back; we knew that coming in," Heinauer said. "But I just felt like when we got behind early like that, it made it a lot easier for them to give it to him and for him to make yards. When they build a lead like that, you can forget it."

In leaping out to the 20-0 first-quarter lead, Shell scored on an 8-yard run, Mark Ross pulled in a 17-yard touchdown pass and quarterback Matt Hundenski scored on a 4-yard keeper.

It wasn't until then Mars answered, making it 20-7 in the opening seconds of the second quarter on a Randy Seebacher 32-yard touchdown pass before Shell fired back again just before halftime, pushing the Hopewell lead to 26-7 on a 2-yard steamroll of a run.

Just out of halftime came the brightest of flashes, with Shell showing why he's considered by some to be one of the most dynamic sophomores in the country.

He took a pitch to the right from his own 33, darted to the right, was hung up against the sideline, made a quick move before heading briefly back into the middle and then back again to the sideline.

Shell looked to be trapped for a loss.

It was a mirage.

The back tiptoed the sideline, made two more Mars defenders miss around midfield and was gone for a 67-yard touchdown to make it 33-7.

"Just how we drew it up, just what we coached him to do," Hopewell coach Dave Vestal said with a laugh, tongue planted firmly in cheek.

"In all honestly, you can't teach that, you can't coach what he did there. He made a couple guys miss and everyone saw what he can do. That was a tremendous run and something he's been blessed with."

For as much as Mars' defense had trouble stopping Hopewell's top ground threat, when Mars had the ball, it was quite the opposite -- the Planets' standout running back Austin Miele couldn't find much semblance of running room.

Miele finished with 65 yards on 14 carries, scoring a late touchdown on a pass from 8 yards.

"He was their guy -- we knew that -- he was the guy we had to stop," Vestal said. "[Miele] is a great player and to take care of him was something that was the focus of our defense."