Academy Park’s defense shines in ‘dominating’ win over Penn Wood

YEADON — Xavier Newman let out a Ric Flair-style “Woooo” and flashed a broad smile.

Academy Park’s senior co-captain and two-way lineman was thrilled to look at the scoreboard and read the final score one more time.

Academy Park 21, Penn Wood 6.

To Newman and the rest of AP’s senior class, Friday’s win at Kerr Field (also known as The Graveyard) was sweet redemption. The Patriots are the two-time defending Del Val League champions who unseated the Knights to take over the team-to-beat mantle.

Well, not anymore. The Knights have the upper hand once again.

“The last two years, they beat us, simple as that. This feels so good right now,” Newman said. “All I know is that we dominated on both sides. That’s one thing I do know. And I know that my boys in the trenches held it down the whole time. I’m very happy, man. We’re 1-0 in the league and now we get ready for next week.”

The Knights sacked All-Delco quarterback Desman Johnson five times and forced four turnovers, including interceptions by Devon Covert, Malik Johnson and Alphonso Hayes.

In the fourth quarter, Newman and sophomore linebacker Damir Simons sacked Johnson on back-to-back plays to force a fourth-and-54 situation. After a punt of 17 yards, the Knights marched 20 yards on five plays, scoring on Covert’s second seven-yard touchdown run of the game to seal their fifth victory of the season.

“I just wanted to pull through for my team,” Covert said. “We tried not to worry about the last two years, but that’s a team that beat you two times in a row, so of course you’re going to think about it. It was in our minds, but we tried to take it like any other game. We knew we just had to come out here and play a good game and we won.”

It’s hard to look at the yards allowed column and say the Knights played a “good game,” but they were excellent on defense. It was as complete a performance as you’re going to see, even if the AP offense was outgained 199-33 in the first half, managed zero first downs and yet held a 7-0 lead.

You can’t predict football …

“In the first half our defense played out of this world and kept us in the game,” Academy Park coach Jason Vosheski said. “But we couldn’t get off the field, they still extended drives and used up a lot of minutes on the clock. I don’t know how many plays we ran (13 to Penn Wood’s 29) but it wasn’t a lot. To sustain a drive with that amount of time, we weren’t doing a very good drive.”

The Knights (5-1, 1-0) seized control at the line of scrimmage in the second half. They opened the third quarter driving 69 yards on 14 plays in 8:16. The drive was capped off by a beautiful, 26-yard pass from Barry Brown to Hayes in the corner of the end zone to put the Knights ahead, 14-0.

Throughout their 5-1 start, the Knights have relied on defense and special teams to make plays and provide the offense with a short field. AP’s offense needed one of those grind-it-out drives that wear down the opposing defense. The offensive line unit of Newman, Efosa Equae, Tajh Harmon, Jaydin Allen and Cole Root provided ample running room for Brown, Covert and fullback Utensee Nankay. Brown completed three of six passes on the drive for 45 yards.

After halftime, the Knights gained six first downs while rushing the ball 20 times for 94 yards.

“In the second half, we got some favorable field position at times but we started to win the battle up front. … That drive we had to start the third quarter, we would love to have that all the time but those things in high school football can be very hard to do,” Vosheski said. “If you don’t get a big play in there – and we’re like a lot of teams in that we need to get a big play – then it’s very hard to get five yards, five yards, five on every play.”

Perhaps the slow start by the Knights could be attributed to Brown’s bruised ribs, an injury that has lingered for a few weeks.

“In the beginning I was taking it easy, seeing what I can do and seeing if I can take more hits,” said Brown, who was 6-for-9 with 51 yards and added 45 yards on the ground. “My O-line was doing real good and then I realized after I took my first one or two hits, I could run the ball more.”

AP’s defense had its hands full against Johnson, who threw for 291 yards and a touchdown. Johnson loves to hold the ball for as long as possible, which can be beneficial and problematic for the Penn Wood offense. AP was able to rattle his cage and the constant, in-your-face pressure forced a handful of errant throws.

In the third quarter, with the Knights up 14-0, Johnson showed what made him an All-Delco quarterback last year by throwing a 49-yard bomb to the end zone on fourth-and-29. Jordin Jones came down with the catch to put the Patriots (3-3, 0-1) on the board. The Hail Mary was AP’s only defensive miss of the night.

“At a certain point he’s a one-trick pony, in my opinion,” Newman said. “He runs around and just heaves it up in the air. How many picks did we get, three? How many sacks did we get, five? We know how he plays and we dominated, know what I’m saying?”

The Knights’ big boys on defense – Isaiah Rogers, Skylar White, Ibrahim Sanogo, among others – were tough and relentless. Penn Wood’s run offense managed only 57 yards on 22 carries. Sixty of those yards came on Johnson’s scrambling.

“We wanted to mix things up on defense, changing coverages and stuff,” Vosheski said. “One guy doesn’t win a game unless we let it. We let it the last two years and they dominated last year and he scored the game-winning touchdown. That’s because we allowed that to happen. He still makes the throw and the kid still makes the catch, but that shouldn’t happen. He’s a super-talented kid, but we just tried to mess around with different coverages and stuff like that.”