BALDWINSVILLE – As they do at the end of each home game, the Baldwinsville football team lined up, two by two, and walked across the Pelcher-Arcaro Stadium turf to walk toward their locker room at the end of a Friday night’s work.
Waiting for them was a large group of students, parents and other fans, most of them clad in red and cheering long and loud for what they had just witnessed.
Trailing West Genesee for most of the night and not moving anywhere on offense, the Bees rose up late in the fourth quarter and, with a series of big plays on both ends, pulled out a 14-13 victory.
That it was even close at all was mostly a tribute to the Bees’ veteran defense, who mostly kept WG in check, especially in a third quarter where it looked like the game would slip away.
Three different times in that period, the Wildcats, ahead 13-6, moved the ball inside B’ville’s 25-yard line. On each occasion, the Bees kept WG off the board, from a missed field goal to two fourth-down stops.
Even with that, it appeared the Wildcats would stay out in front. B’ville was employing two different quarterbacks, junior Patrick Otts and sophomore Nico Wellman, since projected starter Caden Cox was out, and both had struggled staying upright, absorbing several sacks from WG’s front ilne.
Then, with 2:50 to play, a Bees offense that had endured four turnovers surprised the Wildcats through the air.
Otts, working from his own 40-yard line, rolled right and threw deep. Kaleb Paul got behind WG’s coverage, caught the pass and sprinted the rest of the way for the touchdown.
That made it 13-12, and assistant coach Bill Spicer, handling the head-coaching duties on this night, decided that B’ville would go for two points and the lead.
Even though the Bees’ ground game had done little to that point, it was Sam Mellinger going up the middle and finding the end zone.
What’s more, the Wildcats fumbled on the ensuing kickoff and Vince Samoraj recovered. WG used all of its time-outs to try to get the ball back one more time, but two runs by Amir Akins got the first down, allowing B’ville to run out the clock.
Up until Otts’ big throw, the only points the Bees had scored came late in the second quarter when Mellinger returned a punt 50 yards to the end zone, erasing most of a 7-0 lead WG earned when a fumbled exchange in the end zone earlier in the period was recovered by Colin McAvan.
Another of the Bees’ turnovers was a Ken Davis interception in the last minute of the half, which set up River Oudemool’s eight-yard TD pass to McAvan 11 seconds before intermission.
With a short week, B’ville will begin its Class AA slate next Thursday when it hosts Rome Free Academy at 6 p.m.
