What the Jordan-Elbridge football team wanted out of its long trip east to play Cooperstown on Saturday afternoon was a bit more comfort than it had claiming its first victory six days earlier in the Carrier Dome.
That was accomplished, and then some, by the Eagles, whose attack sprung to life in a big way during a 49-8 victory over the Hawkeyes.
Quite unlike its tense 8-7 victory over Thousand Islands in the Kickoff Classic at the Dome, where Austin Barrigar threw a fourth-down pass to Zach Pangaro late in the fourth quarter to set up Barrigar’s go-ahead touchdown, J-E hammered Cooperstown from the outset.
Of the eight passes Barrigar threw, seven of them were completed for 162 yards. Barrigar tossed a pair of TD passes and ran for two others, and the Eagles also struck on special teams, where Kyle Humberstone returned a kickoff 83 yards for six points.
This followed, by one night, Bishop Ludden’s trip to Lowville, where the Gaelic Knights, still searching for its first victory of 2014, stumbled again in a 34-28 defeat to the Red Raiders.
This game went back and forth from the outset. The Gaelic Knights got on the board in the first quarter with Bill Maynard’s 29-yard scoring pass to Cameron Beauford, but Ludden still trailed, 14-7, thanks to Connor Fayles’ pair of TD passes to Scott Bingle.
Donovan Card emerged as a major force in the Gaelic Knights’ attack during the game’s middle stages. He ran 54 yards for one score in the second period and then found the end zone from 18 yards out in the third quarter to forge a 21-21 tie.
But just when Ludden had caught up and were ready to go out in front, a fumble deep in Lowville territory led to Cameron Jackson returning it 92 yards for a defensive TD.
The Gaelic Knights’ defense returned the favor in the fourth quarter, forcing a Red Raiders fumble in its own end zone that Stefan Hutchinson recovered. Travis Cote’s fourth straight successful extra point tied it again, 28-28.
One more time, Lowville moved the ball against Ludden’s defense, and when Robby Campany scored on an 18-yard run, he gave the Red Raiders the winning points as the Gaelic Knights could not answer.
Moving into Class C West division play, Ludden heads back to the road next Friday to face Canastota, who was coming off a 24-12 defeat to Westmoreland after a season-opening 53-0 shutout over Little Falls.
Meanwhile, J-E has its biggest home opener in years against Syracuse’s Institute of Technology Central. Considered the pre-season C West favorite, the defending league champion Eagles lost, 29-22, to the same Thousand Islands team that the Eagles beat, which only adds to the anticipation for this encounter.
