A night’s worth of highs, lows, twists, turns and major momentum shifts came down to a single decision and a single play.
For nearly 47 minutes last Friday at LHS Stadium, the Liverpool football team had dueled with Baldwinsville, with the two sides renewing their passionate neighborhood rivalry.
And though the stakes were far less than the last two years, when the Warriors had prevailed in back-to-back Section III Class AA semifinals, the intensity was the same, right up until the last stop the Bees needed to hand Liverpool a painful 28-27 defeat.
B’ville had rallied from an early 14-point deficit, had gone in front, got caught, and then reclaimed the lead, but a 28-21 margin was far from safe late in the fourth quarter, even though Liverpool had lost its starting quarterback, Matt Rioux, to a shoulder injury earlier in the game, with Zach Neufang taking over under center.
Indeed, the Warriors made a determined march as regulation time wound down. From the Bees’ 43, Tavon Bates took a handoff and, finding daylight, didn’t stop until he found the end zone with 1:02 to play.
With a reliable kicker in Patrick Delgobbo, Liverpool lined up for a tying extra point – only it wasn’t a kick. Instead, Neufang picked up the snap and tried to throw to the end zone for two points and the lead – but Tyler Biviano couldn’t catch it.
B’ville held on from there, and moved to 2-0 in the Class AA-2 division (3-1 overall), tied with Cicero-North Syracuse for first place in the league, while Liverpool fell to 0-2 in league play and suddenly found itself in danger of missing the post-eason.
Embarrassed by C-NS 34-0 in the ‘Star Wars Cup’ game at Bragman Stadium a week earlier, the Warriors were bent on turning things around, and started out by treating the Bees in the same way it did during those 2014 and 2015 playoff games.
Bates capped off the Warriors’ opening drive with an 11-yard touchdown run. Then Liverpool got the ball back and reached the B’ville 25, where Rioux broke free for a TD run of his own that, with Delgobbo’s PAT, made it 14-0.
Patiently, B’ville responded, first with a defense that would knock Rioux out of the game, and then with plenty of touches for tailback Jack Buis, who would carry the ball 27 times for 227 yards.
It was Buis who would put the Bees on the board, scoring on short runs of four and three yards at the end of long, physical drives. By halftime, B’ville was even, 14-14, and it moved out in front in the third quarter when E.J. Edmonds scored from seven yards out.
Unable to move the ball much without Rioux, Liverpool still tied it, 21-21, by forcing a fumble that Dylan Gettys recovered in the end zone. Again, though, the Bees had an answer, moving to the Warriors’ three before Buis netted his third TD of the night.
Ben Dwyer added the extra point, having gone four-for-four on conversions. Little could he have realized that this point would make the difference when Liverpool’s late gamble backfired.
This has turned Saturday’s road game at Utica Proctor into one the Warriors need to win in order to stay in control of its own post-season fate.
