Scotties look to build on close loss
OHIO TOWNSHIP – Even though Southmoreland did not come away with a win at Avonworth Friday night, according to coach Brian Pritts, the 14-7 loss at Lenzner Field gave the team something to build on for the future. “When you’re coming off a year when the team didn’t win a game, you’re looking for building blocks, and I thought we found some of them tonight,” Pritts said. “The kids didn’t give up, they battled and fought hard all game and kept it close, then we put ourselves in a position to tie or win the game in the last minute but just came up a little short.”
The Scotties trailed 14-7 with less than two minutes left in the game and were faced with fourth down and 8 at their own 28 yard line. With no other choice but to go for it, the play started as a sweep left, but quarterback David Hyde handed it off to Erik Frund, who then tossed it to Jimmy King who was sprinting toward the opposite sideline.
King disguised the play beautifully and pulled up before gunning a pass to Jeremy Mains who caught it and sprinted 45 yards to the Avonworth 27 yard line before the confused Antelope defenders caught him.
“We ran that flea flicker play one time in practice and we fumbled the handoff, fumbled the pitch, and threw an interception on the pass, but at that point in the game, we had nothing to lose and went for it and it worked out for us,” Pritts said. “We made a play and made it happen, which we did all game, but just couldn’t make that final play at the end.”
The Scotties drove the ball inside the 10 yard line with less than a minute to go, but fell short on a fourth-and-goal from the 8 after Hyde was sacked for a loss.
“This is David’s (Hyde) first year as a starter and I thought he showed poise to help keep us in the game,” Pritts said. “There were a lot of mistakes made on both teams’ parts.”
Southmoreland recovered three fumbles, including one by Heath Handford who snuffed out a deep lope drive late in the third quarter, and one by Aaron Stasko who recovered a fumble at the Scottie five yard line when Avonworth was threatening to put the game away with eight minutes left and second and 1 from the five yard line in the fourth quarter.
It took the Scotties a quarter to get their game legs under them on both sides of the ball. “We played the whole first quarter in our end of the field,” Pritts said.
They fell behind 7-0 in the first quarter and only managed 20 yards on the ground. Hyde was sacked twice and threw one incomplete pass.
After a short Scottie punt midway through the first quarter, the Antelopes took over at the Southmoreland 25 yard line and broke the ice on the scoreboard. Josh Graham threw an 11-yard strike to Pat Ehrin in the left corner of the end zone on a fourth down and eight.
It did not take Southmoreland long to bounce back in the second quarter though.
Pete Fratto recovered an Antelope fumble on the first play of the second quarter to give the Scotties the ball on the Lope 40.
On their next drive, the Scotties put together their best drive of the first half after returning a punt to the Avonworth 35. An 18-yard pass to Frund to the five was nullified by a holding call, but two plays later, Hyde burst through the middle on an option keeper for a 24-yard touchdown run to tie the game.
After only gaining 14 yards in the first quarter, the offensive line opened up some holes for Frund in the second quarter. After gaining only 14 yards in the first quarter, Frund carried nine times in the second quarter for 68 yards including a 34-yard sweep. He finished the game with 120 yards on 21 carries.
“I just kept banging away and I think the entire team played tonight with the same attitude,” Frund said. “We kept battling and kept it close, which I think is a big improvement over last year.”
Southmoreland’s defense held Avonworth to only 20 yards of offense in the second quarter after giving up 84 yards in the first quarter, but the Antelopes re-took the lead 14-7 early in the third quarter after Graham hit a wide- open Zack Fatigante sprinting down the middle of the field for a 48-yard touchdown.
“We can’t put our tails between our legs after only one game,” Pritts said. “We’ve got eight more games to play and if we keep battling all season like we did tonight, some good things will happen.”