Early flurry, defensive stands push ANC past Springfield Twp
BRYN ATHYN >> When they absolutely needed to Saturday afternoon, the defensive players of the Academy of the New Church’s football team buckled down.
A hot start had given them a big lead, but Springfield Township proved a very resilient opponent and as halftime approached, had a chance to make it a game again. With the ball all but on their doorstep, the Lions dug in and got the stop.
The combination of big plays early and a rugged defense carried ANC to a 29-13 win over the visiting Spartans.
“That’s sort of how it shook out last week too, we did some good things on offense then our defense closed down after that,” ANC coach Ty Klippenstein said. “We sputtered a little bit and credit to Springfield, they’re the ones who made us sputter, they forced us into mistakes. There’s the whole thing where you learn more from losing than winning, which is probably true, but I’m perfectly content to learn and win.”
ANC’s defense set the tone early, forcing a three-and-out keyed by Sean Thornton’s sack on the opening series. The Lions capitalized by marching eight plays down the field and capping the drive with a 14-yard touchdown pass from Jeb Brenfleck to Kai Allen.
Thornton and fellow defensive end Sean McCurdy were solid all day and McCurdy, along with Allen at defensive back, helped force another three-and-out on the ensuing drive. This time, the offense didn’t even get to take the field as Devin Bryant took the punt 65 yards to the house for a 13-0 lead after the extra point was blocked.
Following another three-and-out, ANC made it 20-0 when Brenfleck connected with Allen on a 52-yard bomb for a touchdown.
“He’s a great quarterback, he trusts me and if he lays a ball up there, I’m going to just run and get it,” Allen said. “That just works well for us. It’s always a great feeling to get a lead, it takes a lot of pressure off your shoulders and I think once we get that confidence, it’s game over and we can keep that pace up.”
The Spartans got in gear on their next drive, with quarterback Gabe Franczyk and running back JP McGowan leading the way. Springfield Twp drove all the way to the 11 before Franczyk found wideout Brennan Fleuhr for a 13-yard touchdown to cut the lead to 20-6 on the first play of the second quarter.
After the initial ANC surge, the Spartans pretty much went toe-to-toe with the hosts, but that early deficit was problematic.
“We wanted to be the team that ended their streak, but they’re a really, really good team and we knew that coming in,” Springfield coach Chris Shelly said. “We figured we could do some things to get them off kilter, but giving up those early leads is tough. We didn’t stop playing, I’m so proud of them but I think not being able to punch it in before the half was critical.”
The Spartans defense stepped up after the first few scores, the secondary made some adjustments and forced a punt and a fourth-down stop through the rest of the first half. Following the fourth down stand, Springfield moved the ball again, forced ANC into a fourth down penalty to extend the drive and got to the 14 yard line.
There, the Lions made their stand, giving up just three more yards and getting their own fourth down stop with 18 seconds left to maintain their two-score edge.
“We had outside protection, we didn’t let them get to the edge so they could run their sweeps,” Allen said. “Our d-line got great pressure on pass plays which allowed us defensive backs to lock our guys up.”
Brenfleck added one more score to his day when he found Sam Van Zyverden on a 48-yard pass just two plays into the second half.
“We came is saying we had to get to No. 15 (Brenfleck), the kid’s good and we had to get into his face,” Shelly said. “We had to take our chances, you can’t just play back in coverage on them because they’re so athletic and he puts the ball in the right spots. We brought a ton of pressure and had to make plays in the secondary.”
The Spartans adjusted well after that, with Jack O’Malley and Joey Marino picking off Brenfleck in the second half, but the damage was done with ANC’s second half stop and early third quarter score.
It was all the room the Lions’ defense needed to carry the flag the rest of the day. ANC came up with a fumble recovery, got another fourth down stop in the red zone and after the second Springfield interception, bottled the Spartans up and forced a safety.
“What’s happening is our front four is doing a good job holding their gaps and our linebackers and backfield guys are flowing to the football really well,” Klippenstein said. “Those guys are pretty good players too. Our defensive tackles are good and we rotate them and Sean Thornton and Sean McCurdy are pretty hard to block. You get that and our guys in the backfield flying around, we can be pretty good.”
Thornton had two sacks and Shelly even noted the Spartans tried to stay away from his side as much as they could. Klippenstein added his defensive players are good gang-tackling and even if the first guy misses, the next one usually makes the stop, so they don’t give up too many extra yards.
“Our defense, we can stretch, we can mix it up and mingle but we can really make the adjustments we need,” Allen said. “If we feel like we’re about to break, we can counter-act it. We just had to cut off edges better, that was the only major change, we just had to play our game better.”
ACADEMY OF THE NEW CHURCH 20 0 7 2 – 29
SPRINGFIELD TWP 0 6 0 7 – 13
Scoring Plays
ANC – Jeb Brenfleck 14 pass to Kai Allen (Jimmy Melvin kick) 5:59
ANC – Devin Bryant 65 punt return (kick block) 4:11
ANC – Brenfleck 52 pass to Allen (Melvin kick) 2:52
2nd Quarter
ST – Gabe Franczyk 13 pass to Brennan Fleuhr (kick miss) 11:56
3rd Quarter
ANC – Brenfleck 48 pass to Sam Van Zyverden (Melvin kick) 11:12
4th Quarter
ANC – Safety 5:12
ST – Franczyk 11 pass to Cam Dennis (Even Hincapie kick) 43.3
Team Stats
ANC ST
First downs 9 9
Rushes-Yards 19-8 33-95
Passing 8-19-32 10-21-2-0
Passing Yards 174 130
Total Yards 182 225
Penalties-Yards 8-74 9-86
Fumbles-Lost 3-0 1-1
Individual Stats
Rushing: ANC – Devin Bryant 9-38, Jeb Brenfleck 5-(-16), Pat McManus 2(-3), Ryan Givhan 1-(-5), Chris Keel 1-0, Pat McCabe 1-(-6); ST – JP McGowan 20-57, Gabe Franczyk 10-28, Cam Dennis 2-4, Dylan McKenzie 1-6
Passing: ANC – Brenfleck 8-19-3-21-174; ST – Franczyk 10-21-2-0-130
Receiving: ANC – Kai Allen 2-66, Sam Van Zyverden 3-84 ,Devin Bryant 2-18, Greg Clark 1-6; ST – Brennan Fleuhr 1-13, Cam Dennis 6-70, Keith Grantland 1-4, Dylan McKenzie 1-12
Interceptions: ST – Jake O’Malley, Cam Dennis
