It took less than 12 minutes of football for Christian Brothers Academy to put everyone in the Section III Class AA ranks on notice for the 2023 season.
By scoring four touchdowns in the opening quarter of Saturday night’s season opener in Buffalo against Section VI’s South Park, the Brothers took charge, eventually earning a 49-8 victory over the Sparks.
Almost from the moment CBA left the JMA Dome last November following its sectional Class AA title-game defeat to Cicero-North Syracuse, it had gone to work for this season, and jumped all over a South Park side that won the state Class A championship in 2015.
The opening minutes featured a drive to the Sparks’ five-yard line and Jamier Handford running in for the touchdown, along with a two-point pass from Porter Matt to Riley Clemons-Butenko.
Handford returned minutes later to score a second time on a three-yard run, and then it got to 21-0 when, on the Brothers’ next possession, Matt found Syair Torrence on a 14-yard TD pass.
One more chance led to Isaiah Coleman scoring from seven yards out, and it was 28-0 going to the second quarter, where another trip to the end zone took place on a three-yard pass from Brayden Smith to Daunte Bacheyle.
Strong all night, CBA’s defense got on the board in the third quarter on Zion Green’s short interception return after Coleman netted a second TD on a five-yard run. CBA hosts Union-Endicott, a 2022 state Class A finalist, in Friday’s home opener at Alibrandi Stadium.
Back on Saturday afternoon, East Syracuse Minoa debuted against Rome Free Academy and, despite some big plays in a second-half comeback attempt, lost 23-20 to the Black Knights.
The Spartans were kept off the board in the first half, but its defense was just as stingy. All of RFA’s points came on a Surafia Norries fumble recovery in the end zone and a second-quarter safety.
Trailing 9-0 at the break, ESM would put together its first scoring drive early in the third quarter ending on Mikah Combs’ five-yard run, a hint at bigger plays ahead.
After RFA made it 16-7 on Evan Carlson-Stephenson’s 33-yard TD pass to Isaiah DeJean, Combs returned and, from his own 33, took off on a spring past all the Black Knights’ defenders to the end zone, making it 16-14 going to the fourth quarter.
A long drive led to Carlson-Stephenson’s one-yard scoring plunge, and again Combs answered, his 75-yard TD play cutting the margin to three, but that’s as close as it got.
ESM hosts Whitesboro this weekend as Fayetteville-Manlius opens its season at Horseheads, Jamesville-DeWitt is home to face Newark and Bishop Grimes meets Clinton.
