Jeff Edwards, with some generous help from his Liverpool football teammates, was not going to let his side surrender control of the rivalry with Cicero-North Syracuse – or the trophy that goes with that control.
The annual ‘Star Wars Cup’ game again went in the Warriors’ favor as Edwards, with a career performance in the backfield, pushed Liverpool past the Northstars by a score of 28-14 Friday night at LHS Stadium.
From a 7-7 halftime tie, the Warriors pulled out in front as, time after time, the ball ended up in Edwards’ hands, and the senior tailback chewed up big gains.
By himself, Edwards picked up 251 yards on 25 carries, scoring three touchdowns. Liverpool’s big offensive line cleared the way, overpowering a C-NS defense that kept the visitors in the game most of the way. The Warriors had 314 rushing yards overall.
Despite the well-chronicled contrast in the status of the two programs – stability for the Warriors, struggle for the Northstars – the usual large crowd saw yet another tough battle between the two.
Liverpool moved ahead 7-0 in the first quarter, moving to the C-NS seven-yard line before Edwards took it home for the first of his two TD’s. Despite this, and other big gains, the Warriors were shut out the rest of the half, C-NS showing vast improvement over its season-opening 34-7 defeat to Baldwinsville seven days earlier.
And it was the Northstars tying it up, 7-7, in the second quarter as, from the Warriors’ three-yard line, Jalen Jenkins found the end zone and Steve Messur added the extra point. That’s where it stood at the break, C-NS partisans hoping that interim head coach Jack McAndrew would get his first win in a dramatic setting.
Liverpool didn’t care about the storybook, though, and took charge with a pair of third-quarter scoring drives. Each time, the Warriors moved into the red zone and, on both occasions, Edwards finished it off, reaching the end zone on runs of 13 and five yards as Trevor Monk contributed his second and third extra points.
It was Chris Grennel’s 10-yard TD run in the final period that put the contest out of C-NS’s reach. But the Northstars battled to the end, scoring once more on a 48-yard pass from Tyler Griffo to Steve Mirzio.
As always, turnovers mattered. Liverpool forced three of them, to C-NS’s one, and the defense overall atoned for the 40 points it allowed to Henninger in the Sept. 1 opener.
The 0-2 Northstars face a daunting test next Friday when it visits 2-0 CBA in the Class AA-2 division opener at 6:30 at Alibrandi Stadium. The Brothers are coming off a 35-6 win over Utica Proctor in its home opener.
Liverpool also begins league play, staying at home to meet Auburn for a 7 p.m. kickoff. After winning just one game a year ago, the Maroons are 2-0 this fall, having piled up 94 points in impressive victories over Riverside and Central Square.
