Lower Moreland earns first BAL win against Morrisville

The best way that Lower Moreland coach Mark Mayson could describe the first three weeks of the 2015 season was “difficult.”
Over the course of the first three weeks the Lions were outscored 120-6. But with the start of league play starting Monday night the Lions got a fresh start with a 0-0 record in the Bicentennial Athletic League.
Lower Moreland showed a solid performance in all three phases of the game to earn its first victory of the year with a 10-7 win to host Morrisville Monday night.
Offensively the Lions went to Matt Gallagher as their top weapon. Gallagher had team highs in carries, 17, and yards, 73. Gallagher also scored the lone Lower Moreland touchdown on a 13-yard plunge on the Lions first offensive series of the game.
“He’s been in and out, he hasn’t played all the time,” Mayson said. “We knew going in (to the season) from last year he was our top back.”
Defensively, Lower Moreland was dominant. Outside of a Morrisville 98-yard touchdown drive that spanned the end of the third quarter into the early part of the fourth the Lion defense was up to the task.
Lower Moreland held the Bulldogs to 190 total yards and came up with a crucial fourth-quarter interception by Josh Wattenmaker to seal the game for the Lions.
“It was great. I was very pleased,” Mayson said of his team’s defensive performance. “We’ve given up a fair amount of points these first few weeks so to have a defensive performance like this is very gratifying.”
The turning point in the game came with 1:41 remaining in the second quarter. The Lions faced a fourth and goal from the three-yard line. Most high school coaches would feel much more confident in its offense to pick the three yards to score a touchdown.
Mayson opted to send out field goal kicker Charlie Butz. Butz nailed the 20-yard field goal to give Lower Moreland a two score lead. Butz’ kick would go on to be the game winning score as Morrisville cut the lead to 10-7 in the fourth quarter.
The Butz field goal might not have even been his best play of the game as he also hit two punts that pinned the Bulldogs inside their own five-yard line and struck two other punts of over 50 yards to flip field position.
“He was great. He turned the field around a couple times,” Mayson said of Butz. “(I wanted to make it) two scores. I was confident he was going to make it. I felt two score was very important.””