For their first games in October, the Cazenovia and Chittenango football teams, who went a combined 7-1 in September, both hit the road – and both would win big.
The state Class B no. 2-ranked Lakers recorded its third shutout of the season, blanking Camden 40-0, while the Bears, rebounding from its loss at Homer, went to Cortland and rolled past the Purple Tigers 33-8.
One remarkable aspect of Cazenovia’s latest 5-0 start is that it hasn’t allowed a point to anyone in three games away from Buckley-Volo Field.
Amsterdam (in the Carrier Dome on Sept. 4) and South Jefferson (on Sept. 19) both got blanked, and now the Lakers would do the same at Camden, limiting the Blue Devils to 82 total yards.
Jake Shaffner and Brendan Whalen led the unit with eight tackles apiece, while Shaffner, Alex Nannery and Sawyer Hunt recorded sacks and Anthony Vecchiarelli earned an interception.
Meanwhile, Cazenovia’s offense was, again, steady and productive, building a 28-0 halftime lead as T.J. Connellan scored three touchdowns – a 25-yard run in the first quarter, plus runs of 47 and six yards in the second period. Vecchiarelli found the end zone on a 16-yard run.
For the night, Connellan ran for 66 yards and had four catches for 108 yards. Shaffner was efficient at quarterback, completing nine of 13 passes for 202 yards.
These were the type of numbers that Chittenango never got close to at Homer the week before, managing just 52 total yards and three first downs in a 25-0 defeat to the defending Section III Class B champion Trojans.
Seven days later, down the road from Homer, Chittenango had another chance to prove it could play well away from Bear Country, and took full advantage of it, clinching a winning regular-season record for 2015 with its effort at Cortland.
It started with a Bears defense that kept the Purple Tigers off the board until the fourth quarter, by which point Chittenango had a 33-0 lead.
Special teams got involved, too, blocking a punt deep in Cortland territory in the second quarter that Jacob Burgan returned five yards for a TD to make it 13-0. Justin Gondeck had scored the game’s first point on a one-yard sneak in the opening period.
During the third quarter, when the Bears put it away with a 20-0 outburst, Gondeck added a second TD, plus a two-point pass to Hunter Hendrix, while Christian Cerio found the end zone twice on runs of six and two yards.
Now Chittenango, no. 22 in last week’s state Class B rankings, heads back home for a crucial game next Friday against 3-2 Westhill, who has won two straight. A win would assure the Bears of staying at home for the opening round of the Section III playoffs. Game time is 7 p.m.
Following that, Cazenovia takes its 5-0 mark to Vernon-Verona-Sherrill for next Saturday’s 2 p.m. kickoff. The Red Devils are 4-1, coming off an 8-7 win over South Jefferson (its second one-point win this year), and are the only team that can stop the Lakers from yet another Class B East division regular-season title.
