Mercury Football Preview: Locals embrace balance ahead of district playoffs
One of the larger points of emphasis this season for some of the Pioneer Athletic Conference’s top squads was the gradual transition to more balanced offenses.
League champions Spring-Ford ran the ball on more than 70 percent of their offensive snaps over the past few weeks. Frontier Division champions Pope John Paul II developed a stable of 4-5 different ballcarriers who can contribute to the offense, while Perkiomen Valley boasts the area’s strongest one-two punch in senior backs Jacob Sturm and Jon Moccia.
Of course, none of it is meant to replace the passing game, as each school boasts a passer with over 2,000 yards on the 2019 season. The idea was to become multi-faceted, with the ability to light up the scoreboard by ground or by air.
To see true ‘run-based’ offense, look no further than this week’s opponents for the three surviving Liberty Division schools Spring-Ford, Perkiomen Valley and Owen J. Roberts.
Class 6A
No. 14 Owen J. Roberts (8-2) at No. 3 Garnet Valley (9-1); 7 p.m. Friday
Common opponents: OJR opened the season with a 28-0 shutout of Conestoga, while Garnet Valley topped the Pioneers 56-28 in Week 6.
Preview: The Wildcats finished the 2019 as District 1’s top 6A scoring defense, allowing just over seven points per contest over the 10-game slate. Their reward? Perhaps the most grueling test in all of District 1: a first-round playoff date with the Central League champion Garnet Valley.
Mike Ricci was hired as Jaguars’ head coach back in 1986, and his list of accomplishments would require their own column. Suffice to say his hallmark is discipline and execution, best embodied in a running game averaging almost 7.5 yards per carry and almost 350 yards per contest over GV’s current nine-game winning streak. Sounds impressive, but it’s down a tick from last year’s mark of 374.8 rushing yards per game.
Scoring is up, however, with the Jaguars approaching 45 points per game and scoring at least 35 points during each game of the winning streak. Led by QB Ryan Gallagher, the Jags have five players with over 300 yards rushing this year. Defenses can’t focus on any one player, but they can focus on the run in particular, as Garnet Valley’s leading receiver has six catches on the season for 71 yards.
That could be bad news for OJR, as one of the strengths of the district’s leading defense has been a secondary led by Jon Hannevig and Matt Cutrone.
Cutrone easily led the PAC with nine interceptions this year, but he won’t likely see nine total passing attempts on Friday. Instead, the focus will be finding ways to deal with the pure size of Garnet Valley on the offensive line and deciphering the option approach.
Jaguars QB Gallagher left last week’s game with an injury and was replaced by Kevin McGarrey. Gallagher’s status is unknown for Friday.
Offensively, the Wildcats will look to QB Cooper Chamberlain and his rapport with WR Dante DeNardo to keep pace with the Jaguars. RB Josh Jackson remains the Wildcats’ best big-play threat, and his work in the running game with Chamberlain represents OJR’s best hope to pull the upset.
If the Wildcats can control the ball early and make Garnet Valley play from behind … well, the Jaguars will still run the football, but the urgency will be turned up a notch.
No. 13 Perkiomen Valley at No. 4 Downingtown East; 7 p.m. Saturday
Common opponents: Downingtown East topped the Vikings, 28-13, at Perk Valley in Week 2 … Both squads lost to No. 1 Downingtown West, PV dropping a 33-17 decision in Week 4 while the Cougars fell 63-35 in Week 7.
Preview: This game will wait an extra 24 hours, as Downingtown West hosts its own opening-round matchup at Kottmeyer Stadium on Friday night against Pennsbury. Perkiomen Valley coach Rob Heist plans to use that extra time coming up with ways to attack what he called ‘the best set of linebackers I’ve seen in a long time’ for Downingtown East.
Heist’s offense will be without PAC-leading receiver Randy Washington, lost for the season with a broken arm. In Washington’s absence, sophomore QB Ethan Kohler will look to Nick McMenamin and Mike Dougherty as primary pass catchers, while Rasheem Grayson has come on late to join the consistent, productive running back tandem of Jacob Sturm and Jon Moccia.
Spencer Uggla and Stanley Bryant split the main ball-carrying duties for Downingtown East, and while their statistical profiles display no major differences, Uggla appears to play the ‘thunder’ role to Bryant’s lightning. Either can churn out five yards at any time, with Bryant a slight favorite to break big runs.
Connor Noble, the star of D-East’s Week 2 victory over PV, serves as the Cougars’ leading receiver for the reliable QB Drew Person, completing around 60 percent of his passes on the season. Downingtown East comes into the contest off one of the program’s biggest victories in years, handing Coatesville its first Ches-Mont loss since 2015 last Friday by a score of 28-24.
No. 12 Haverford (8-2) at No. 5 Spring-Ford (8-2); 7 p.m. Friday
Common opponents: None.
Preview: Like their PAC Liberty brethren, the Rams’ defense will be focused primarily on stopping the run. Unlike Perk Valley and OJR, Spring-Ford’s efforts will focus largely on one player.
It isn’t that Haverford QB Trey Blair is the only threat on the Fords’ offense, not by a long shot. It’s just that numbers like 112 rushes for 1,266 yards (11.3 yards per carry) and 17 TDs demand special attention, especially when coupled with nearly 75 percent passing accuracy (64-for-86) and another half-dozen TDs through the air. In fact, when asked what most concerned him about the matchup with the Central League runners up, Spring-Ford coach Chad Brubaker’s answer started and ended with Blair, a University of Buffalo commit.
Chasen Wint, a fellow senior, averages about 6.5 yards over 101 carries this season with another dozen touchdowns to his credit. Wint returned last week from a knee injury to carry 15 times for 68 yards and three scores. The Fords have rolled off eight consecutive wins after an 0-2 start.
Ryan Engro and the PAC champion Rams offense will be facing a defense allowing only 8.6 points per game. Spring-Ford hopes to continue their recent trend of 200-plus yard rushing outings, with Armante Haynes, who eclipsed the 1,000-yard mark in last week’s 38-21 victory over Pope John Paul II, leading the way. BJ Beard’s 30-yard TD reception provided the highlight of the passing game last week, while the reliable Dante Bonanni upped his area-leading reception total to 48 with another half-dozen grabs.
Senior linebacker James Albert is back from injury to lead a linebacking corps that also features emerging sophomores Johnny Pergine, JSeth Owens, and Haynes.
Class 5A
No. 12 Upper Merion (5-5) at No. 5 Strath Haven (8-2); 7 p.m. Friday
Common opponents: Both teams scored easy victories over Lower Merion, Upper Merion in a season-opening 41-7 game and the Panthers scoring a 56-0 shutout last week.
Preview: No, this preview is not copied-and-pasted from the Garnet Valley section: the Central League’s Panthers feature an offense that brings new definition to the term “run dominant,” maintaining a run/pass ratio of more than 10:1 over the season. John Prochniak (952 yards on 6.6. yards per carry, 15 TDs) and Ibo Pio (743 yards on 7.7 yards per carry, eight TDs) provide the bulk of the production, though Evan Blake and Jaris Adams are also over 300 yards rushing for the season. QB Jack Ryder has only attempted 42 passes on the campaign, completing 17 of them to attempt to keep defenses honest.
But it’s no coincidence that the Panthers’ two losses came in the contests where they were held below five yards per carry by two of the squads covered above, Garnet Valley and Haverford.
And that will be the challenge for an Upper Merion squad that, when clicking on all cylinders, can provide a similar ground-based challenge with seniors Anthony Swenda and Ty Lobban offering a power-and-speed combination, while QB Dale Clayton looks to his brother Marc and Aaron Anderson as his main pass-catching threats. The Swenda/Lobban duo combined for 237 yards rushing and three scores in last week’s crossover victory against Methacton. A similar performance would be a big first step to a Friday night upset.
Class 4A
No. 3 Bishop Shanahan (5-5) at No. 2 Pottsgrove; 7 p.m. Friday
Common opponents: None.
Preview: This appears to be one of the weekend’s most competitive matchups. It certainly was a highlight of the opening weekend of districts last season when the Falcons edged the Eagles, 14-13, in a rain-soaked matchup at Pennypacker Field in a District One Class 4A semifinal.
Shanahan comes into the identical matchup this year down at least three starters, and while coach Paul Meyers didn’t go into details on the specific players or injuries, every bit of depth will matter for two teams that appear equally matched on paper. Pottsgrove’s measured improvement on defense is apparent at all three levels, as Darrian Seaman leads a productive group of linemen, while the back seven is ably manned by youngsters, specifically linebacker Max Neeson and safety Rylee Howard.
PAC-leading rusher Isaiah Taylor hopes to provide the difference for Pottsgrove as the contest’s most dynamic player, while Cooper Jordan has had a breakout year as a runner and passer for the Eagles’ offense. Luke Kaiser’s work on special teams could provide the difference for the three-time defending 4A champions Pottsgrove in what figures to be a close, low-scoring battle.
Class 3A
School of the Future (6-4) at Pope John Paul II (8-2); 7 p.m. Friday at Norristown
Common opponents: None.
Preview: The combined District 1/12 subregional kicks off with the PAC runner-up Golden Panthers facing D12’s School of the Future, featuring an almost perfectly balanced offense that averages 158 rushing yards and 173 yards through the air per contest. Junior Diandre Green takes the controls of the passing game with almost 1,800 passing yards and is good for a first-down scramble or two, while classmate Mujaheed Muhammad made the most of only 95 carries with 734 rushing yards and eleven scores.
The Firebirds’ main challenge figures to be on the defensive side, where they haven’t seen an attack that can measure PJP II’s Kamal Gray and his arsenal of weapons in the passing game. Steve Skarbek and Justin Kormos are the main targets at receiver, but tight end Dylan Walker and running back Andrew McDonald force defenses to cover the entire field. On defense, Justin Mitala’s astounding 122 tackles (26 for loss) lead the Golden Panthers. Coming off a 23-tackle performance in last week’s PAC championship game with Spring-Ford, Mitala figures to make life difficult on the Firebirds’ running game.
