The Catasauqua defense was looking for redemption.

It found exactly that against Northern Lehigh.A week after surrendering a season’s worth of big plays in a loss to Salisbury, the Rough Rider ‘D’ made some big plays of its own on Friday.Thanks in large part to a pair of first-half defensive scores, Catasauqua defeated the Bulldogs, 38-20.“Last week, just about everything that could wrong for us defensively, did go wrong,” said Catasauqua coach Phil Dorn. “We worked hard on our defense this week at practice and it paid off.“I don’t know if the numbers will reflect it, but this was like night and day compared to how we played last week. We made big plays and did a nice job of limiting their big plays.”The Rough Riders jumped out to a 21-0 lead as Wil-Quon Clemons raced 41 yards with a fumble recovery for one score and Justis Jourdain returned an interception 45 yards for another score.“Terrible. We played terrible to start the game,” said Northern Lehigh coach Joe Tout. “I’m embarrassed. We didn’t look like we were prepared to play and that’s on me and my coaches.“With the way we are constructed to play, we can’t give up a couple of defensive touchdowns and expect to win. It’s really hard for us to overcome those kind of mistakes. We aren’t a team that can afford to get that far behind.”The Bulldogs did make it interesting, however.After falling behind early, Northern Lehigh used a pair of late second-quarter touchdowns to get back in the game.The Bulldogs (0-2) drove 56 yards in nine plays to get on the board. Mason Seiler scored from a yard out with 4:14 left in the half to make it 21-7.Northern Lehigh’s defense then came up big when Zach Moyer intercepted a pass at the Catty 36-yard line with 1:13 remaining in the half. The Bulldogs capitalized when Justin Paul ran 16 yards for a score just seconds before intermission.“The one bright spot we can take away from tonight is our kids didn’t quit when we fell behind,” said Tout. “We finished the second quarter strong and at halftime I thought we were in good shape.“We had the momentum, but we just couldn’t build on that in the second half.”Northern Lehigh was still within striking distance when Paul scored his second TD of the game early in the fourth quarter to cut the margin to 24-20.But the Rough Riders (2-0) responded with touchdown runs by Derrick Rodriguez and Clemons on their next two possessions to seal the victory. Both scores were set up by the Catasauqua passing attack.“Our quarterback did a nice job with the offense,” said Dorn about the performance of Andrew Brett. “We run a lot of RPOs (run/pass options) and Andrew was getting the ball out in the flat to our receivers.“They were having trouble stopping that quick pass, so we just kept going back to it.”PAUL ANSWERS THE CALL ... Justin Paul had a strong offensive game for the Bulldogs, carrying 12 times for 90, catching one pass for 16 yards, and scoring two of his team’s three TDs.BOUNCE BACK ... Dorn said the Catasauqua defensive numbers might not match up with how well he thought the unit played. But the numbers were solid (264 total yards allowed), and compared to the 588 yards the Roughies allowed in their opener, the improvement was obvious.SPEED KILLS ... Tout said his defensive backs weren’t playing with enough confidence to shut down the Catty passing game. “We played like we were afraid to get beat,” said Tout. “But give Catasauqua credit, they took advantage of their speed on the perimeter. I would say the five fastest guys on the field played for them.”