What had taken a full season for the Cazenovia football team to meticulously put together came crumbling apart in less than six minutes of game time.
The Lakers, on the cusp of returning to the Carrier Dome as an undefeated power in search of back-to-back Section III titles, saw Oneida come back late in the fourth quarter and, with a pair of clutch scoring drives, pull off a stunning 12-10 win Saturday in the Class B semifinal at Chittenango High School.
Oneida quarterback Tyler Mallinder capped off the rally when, on a rollout play, he found Brandon Worley in the end zone for a seven-yard touchdown pass with 20.9 seconds left.
For three and a half quarters, this game, the fourth between Cazenovia and Oneida in the last two seasons (the Lakers had won the previous three) had belonged to the defensive sides.
This was especially true for the Lakers. Three times, Cazenovia had forced turnovers, and in the third quarter it had recorded four sacks of Mallinder, three of them made by Barclay Talbot.
All that changed, though, after the Lakers’ only sustained drive of the afternoon, an 11-play, 62-yard march, led to sophomore Mike Nourse’s one-yard touchdown run with 5:47 to play, which expanded Cazenovia’s lead to 10-0. Five different players – Nourse, Tanner Whiteman, Jake Wilson, Andrew Vogl and Darian Smith – had gained valuable yards on that march.
Right after Nourse scored, Oneida took the ball on its own 25 and, forced to quicken the pace, did so, which appeared to catch the Lakers a bit off guard.
Taking advantage, Mallinder started finding his receivers for a series of completions, none bigger than a 16-yard pass to Worley on fourth-and-10. Moments later, with 3:26 to play, Worley lobbed a nine-yard scoring pass to Kyle Peck, and though the conversion missed, the Indians had pulled within 10-6.
Cazenovia, taking the ensuing kickoff at its own 33, needed to make just one first down to run out the clock. But it could not convert and, with 2:18 left, the Indians got the ball back on its own 40.
Immediately, Mallinder started clicking again, finding Chris Morehouse on a 30-yard pass that moved the Indians deep into Laker territory. Soon enough, though, the Lakers had forced a fourth-and-four at the 29, needing just one more stop to clinch it.
Instead, Mallinder hit Worley, who eluded tacklers and slid to the Cazenovia seven-yard line. Two more plays went nowhere, but on third-and-goal, Mallinder rolled out again, and Worley was all alone in the end zone for the clinching points.
Judge was a large reason why Cazenovia kept that 3-0 lead through the first half. Not only had he made the field goal, he caught a 33-yard option pass from Vogl to set up that kick, and had stripped Morehouse of the ball just as he was returning a Whiteman interception to the end zone early in the second quarter.
But the Indians’ rally left the Lakers stunned. A senior class that included Judge, Talbot, Whiteman, Smith, David Ayer, Alex Szlamczynski, Nick Petrovich, Dylan Muller, Joe Romagnoli and Nick Christakos had expected to give Cazenovia another sectional title.
Instead, they’ll watch Oneida face Chittenango for the sectional title, proud of the 8-1 record they put together, but wishing it could have those last six minutes of the season over again.
