Even in a rout, Episcopal defense engineers its own energy

NEWTOWN SQUARE — It’s a safe bet that Episcopal Academy has had better competition in intrasquad scrimmages than the Brooklyn Tech Engineers offered Saturday.

But considering the Churchmen were without an opponent because of a late cancellation, playing any game, even a 49-6 rout that wasn’t as close as that score would indicate, is better than no game at all.

After Lawrenceville (N.J.) pulled out of a scheduled game because its fall season began later than anticipated and its football team would have been unprepared, Episcopal coach Todd Fairlie was left with very few options to fill the hole in his schedule.

He tried a couple of local schools that declined, and when the dust settled, all that was left was Brooklyn Tech.

“You can’t control the elements of the game, but there are always teachable moments in there,” Fairlie said. “You always want competitive games, but if you take this chance and you create depth and get reps for some guys, it creates experience for later in the year when you might need it.”

Fairlie did just that, especially on defense, where the Churchmen had three interceptions, two returned for touchdowns.

“We watched a ton of film and knew what they were going to do,” said junior free safety Aiden Chavis, who had one of the picks. “I clocked about three hours of film myself. A game like this gives us a little confidence going into a game with Northeast next week.

“We’ll take this, a win is a win, but we’re going to have step it up a few levels next week.”

It was one of the more lopsided games you’ll see. Consider:

– Episcopal Academy scored more points (49) than offensive plays run (35), averaging nearly a first down (9.4 yards) on every play.

– Subtracting yards lost to penalties, Brooklyn Tech drove more miles to get to Episcopal (112) then positive yards gained (94).

– Speaking of penalties, Brooklyn Tech had more penalty yards at halftime (30) than yards from scrimmage (24).

The Churchmen (2-0) were efficient. They had one touchdown drive of nine plays and one of six plays. The other eight times they had the ball, they ran four plays or fewer, three drives ending in scores.

Maurcus McDaniel had a nice game at quarterback, going 10-for-13 with three touchdowns and rushing for a fourth. Not bad considering he was only on the field on offense for a total of 11:43.

Joe Graham did most of the scoring. The junior tight end/linebacker scored three touchdowns — two receiving and one on an interception. Both TD catches came on the same play call: A play-action pass from the Engineers 10-yard line in which the linebackers bit on the fake and left him wide open after slipping behind them in the end zone.

His defensive touchdown was one where he initially had no idea he had a chance to score.

“After I caught the ball, I was thinking to just protect the ball on my way to the ground as I got tackled,” Graham said. “But after looking around for someone on their team to hit me, I realized that wasn’t going to happen. And I had a lot of green in front of me.”

It was 32-0 at halftime, but while the fans were grabbing hot dogs and sodas, the officials huddled and decided a 25-yard field goal by Nick Bates with 3:48 to play that they originally said was good, wasn’t.

As such, the officials took the field goal off the board — a good 15 minutes and nine plays after the kick. Why they didn’t fix the call when it happened, is anyone’s guess.

An announcement was made at the start of the second half and confused the scoreboard operator, who struggled to keep the score correct the rest of the game, never giving the Churchmen credit for a touchdown that they actually did score.

Yep, it was that kind of game.