Lincoln-Way Central’s statistics were beyond gaudy Friday night.

The Knights’ best number was the score – 26-14 in their favor over Providence – but the eye-poppers came in yardage. They ran for 360 yards on 40 carries and notched 511 yards overall. Justin Cobbs collected 215 of those ground yards on 25 carries, most of them after his backfield partner, Luke Tingley, was out of the contest with an apparent left leg injury.

Tingley had already piled up 132 rushing yards on seven carries before he was tackled on a 6-yard out pattern midway through the second quarter. He began slamming the ground with his fist even before the tackler pulled away, and it appeared the injury may have made a spectator faint.

Tingley had opened the scoring on a 70-yard burst down the right sideline, outrunning a host of potential tacklers 82 seconds after the opening kickoff.

He scooted down the same sideline for another 45 yards on the Knights’ third possession, which climaxed with Drew Woodburn’s 15-yard touchdown toss to Lucas Andresen, the first of their three scoring collaborations.

For the Knights (2-0), it was a night of mixed feelings.

“He has had a string of injuries, and he’s one of our guys,” said Central end coach Dave Woodburn of Tingley. “He’s one of our leaders. We’re worried about him. That’s a tough one.”

Cobbs stepped right up.

“When I saw him go down, my ears definitely dropped,” Cobbs said. “That’s when I knew I had to step up a little bit more. I just see the green grass. My line did really good today, made it easy for me.”

The second Woodburn-Andresen touchdown covered 53 yards, 45 after the catch courtesy of Andresen’s fleet feet, with 4:35 left in the third. They also hooked up for a 26-yard pitch-catch-score with 10:18 remaining. Andresen had 123 yards on five receptions.

The scores for the Celtics (1-1) came on a standard 5-yard Dominic Vita touchdown run to knot the score at 7 and on a most unconventional 82-yard, impromptu combination which saw Vita hit Xavier Coleman with a completion that covered 42 yards before Coleman fumbled. DeAngelo Coates picked it up, taking it the final 40 yards for the touchdown to tie the game at 14.

“We got challenged early,” Dave Woodburn said. “(Coleman) is really, really good. They hit us with two screen passes, and we didn’t do our job there, but after that our guys came through.”

All four first-half touchdowns were scored on third downs.

Vita was 9 of 22 for 138 yards.