It took a month, and five games, before the Jamesville-DeWitt football team could savor a victory, something that Bishop Grimes was getting quite used to – and East Syracuse-Minoa was familiar with, too, until an unlikely foe intervened.
Continuing its hot start, the Cobras moved to 4-1 on the season last Friday night, going to Altmar-Parish-Williamstown and holding on for a 22-13 victory over the Rebels.
Kept quiet in the early stages, Grimes fell behind, 7-0, as APW’s Austin Appleby scored on a 37-yard run. Then Grimes put together its first scoring drive in the second period, as Greg Przybyszewski went five yards for the touchdown.
A successful two-point conversion gave the Cobras an 8-7 lead, which it held at halftime. Then it expanded the margin to 14-7 in the third quarter with a drive to the Rebels’ two-yard line, from where Jordan Newman scored.
As it turned out, Przyzyszewski’s second TD, on a five-yard run in the fourth quarter, and the subsequent two-point conversion were needed. APW chipped away at the 22-7 lead with James Parkhurst’s 90-yard scoring pass to Appleby, but missed the conversion, and Grimes never allowed APW to get close to the end zone.
The night before, an 0-4 start for J-D began to fade away in its game at Cortland, where the Red Rams controlled matters on both sides of the ball for most of the night to beat the Purple Tigers 28-14.
The short week of preparation did little to bug the Rams, for it took charge with one big play. Ernest Shaw, taking a handoff at his own 19-yard line, found a gap and then outran all of the Cortland defenders to the end zone.
That put J-D up 7-0, and Shaw wasn’t done, adding a seven-yard scoring run later in the half in between TD sprints of seven and four yards by Mike Schwedes.
All of this helped the Rams accumulate a 28-0 lead, and its defense, improving with each game, kept Cortland off the board until the latter stages, when a pair of TD’s cut the margin in half, but didn’t change the outcome.
This moved the Rams to 1-1 in the Class A American division, where ESM was expected to set the pace, and had won its first two league games – until Saturday, when Oswego, a long-time doormat in the division, rose up to stun the Spartans 28-20.
At 1-3 on the season, the Buccaneers’ lone win of the season had come over Class B Phoenix, a 40-21 decision, so it gave no indication that it was going to reverse course, against ESM, who had routed J-D (41-0) and Cortland (40-12) to erase an 0-2 start and appeared to be rounding into form.
Oswego quarterback Ed Sheridan gave indications of what was to come when he threw a 30-yard TD pass to Tyree Varner in the first quarter. ESM countered with its own big play as Eric Johnson ran 38 yards to the end zone and Kollin Diedrickson’s extra point tied it, 7-7.
During the second period, Brandon Breen connected on a 51-yard scoring pass to Deshaun Gorman. Yet the Bucs shook that off as it twice found the end zone, Sheridan throwing a 25-yard TD pass to Tyree Vernbe and scoring on his own one-yard sneak, too.
That put Oswego in front, 21-14, going to halftime. When RiQuelle Othman scored on a two-yard run in the third period, ESM moved within one, 21-20, but missed the conversion.
Again, the Bucs would respond, Sheridan running five yards for his second TD in the fourth quarter, with Aziret Nazariliev adding the extra point. Needing a touchdown and two points to tie, ESM was stopped several times down the stretch, including an Armond Vooris interception.
This sets up a big game on Friday as ESM (2-1 league) meets Fulton (2-0 league) for first place in the American division, while J-D takes its shot at Oswego as part of its annual Hall of Fame festivities and Bishop Grimes visits Oriskany on Saturday.
