DEWITT – Some big sports events do not equal the hype that precedes them. Others do so.
Then there was the matter of Friday night’s football showdown at Alibrandi Stadium between the 2021 state Class A champions (Christian Brothers Academy) and the reigning four-time Section III Class A champions (Cicero-North Syracuse), which managed to exceed whatever people may have thought.
Back and forth the two powers went, trading points, big plays, turnovers, personal fouls and plenty of high emotion through 48 action-packed minutes, decided only when the Brothers made one timely defensive stop to preserve a 42-41 victory over the Northstars.
For all the twists, turns and major momentum shifts, it came down to a single play with 1:15 left in regulation.
Once down 35-14, the Northstars had produced four second-half touchdowns, the last of them when, down 42-35, it recovered a squib kick at midfield and drove right to CBA’s two-yard line, from where sophomore Anthony Johnson scored for the fourth time.
Without hesitation, C-NS decided to go for two points and the lead. Having put together three prolonged scoring drives and run the ball well, the Northstars instead chose a pass from Jaxon Razmovski – which CBA linebacker Andrew Cooney broke up before it reached the end zone.
Then, after recovering a short kickoff, Jordan Rae threw a first-down pass to Jason Brunson, allowing the Brothers to run out the clock and, though exhausted, celebrate a win that seemed to have everything.
It was C-NS that had struck first, Razmovski’s 45-yard pass to Nate Williams setting up a short TD plunge, but the Northstars, up 6-0, could not capitalize on a CBA fumble on its second play from scrimmage, stopped on fourth down.
Energized, the Brothers turned to Syair Torrence, who in short order (1) caught a 10-yard TD pass from Rae with a terrific sideline catch, (2) made a third-down sack and then (3) threw an option 58-yard scoring pass to a wide-open Ammari Pitts.
It didn’t stop there, either. Rae found Pitts on a 19-yard rollout pass for another TD, then connected with Brunson on a 16-yard scoring pass in the last seconds of the half after Johnson had gone 24 yards for his first TD of the night.
When CBA took the second-half kickoff and scored again on Rae’s 16-yard scramble, C-NS was down by the same 21-point margin by from which it rallied to stun Liverpool in the 2019 sectional semifinals. And it nearly did so again here.
Johnson’s second TD, on a 45-yard run following a long kick return by Jayceon McGrew, sparked the comeback. Two long drives followed, consuming 14 minutes of clock between them and each ending with the Northstars finding the end zone on short runs by Johnson and Razmovski.
In between, CBA had stretched it to 42-28 early in the fourth quarter, a 52-yard screen pass to Jamier Handford leading to Rae finding James Bell over the middle for 30 yards and a TD.
Everett Gilchirst’s sixth straight extra point followed – and it proved the winning point after the Brothers, at the last moment, kept C-NS from pulling it off, leaving players on both sides wondering what might happen if these sides met again in the post-season.
Rae threw 20 times, completing 18 of those passes for 276 yards. Handford caught six of those passes for 109 yards.
