Coming off of a tough loss, Kennett High’s Blue Demons rise to the challenge and achieve victory against the West Chester East Vikings
By P.J. D’Annunzio, Staff Writer KennettTimes.com
Kennett's Tyler Boyer breaks into the open against West Chester East, Friday.
WEST CHESTER—In a game with so many penalty calls that it could be easily mistaken for Flag Day, the Blue Demons managed pull out a spectacular 41-34 win against a tough West Chester East team.
“We knew their offense was good, their split ends and running backs,” Kennett head coach Scott Green said of East, “But we used our conditioning to our advantage.”
And all of that conditioning certainly came in handy as it was a back and forth game, each team answering the other with crossfire touchdowns.
Early in the first quarter Kennett’s Barry Tomasetti Jr. connected with Anthony Torello for a 20 yard and TD, scoring the first one of the game.
East received Kennett’s punt and went for a long return up the field, eventually scoring a TD, but due to the quick hands of Malik Rochester, the extra point was blocked in midair making the score 7-6, still in Kennett’s favor.
Kennett's Jordan Lardari fights for yardage against West Chester East, Friday.
For the rest of the first quarter the Vikings threw away passes like expired milk, simply unable to make a completion. This played into the Demons’ favor in a Kennett possession when Tomasetti found an opening and flew 40 yards forward for another Kennett TD. A blocked two-point conversion made the score 13-6.
Sure enough, in the second quarter, East responded in kind with another touch down of their own, and—you guessed it—a blocked two-point conversion attempt bring the teams within one point of each other at 13-12.
The game of musical touchdowns would continue throughout the game, peppered with penalty calls from trigger happy officials. Cries of “Take the bus back to Pocopson!” were hurled at the refs from the Visitor’s bleachers.
Kennett also did a stellar job of forcing turnovers, with blocked passes and subsequent recoveries from Malik Rochester and Tyler Boyer, and a host of recovered fumbles, some of which resulted in significant gains in yardage.
By the third quarter Tomasetti had scored his third TD, advancing Kennett’s lead to 26-18 (the result of a recovery from a Vikings fumble).
East, however, refused to give up. The Vikings managed to not only score a TD, but also complete a two-point conversion, tying the game at 26-26.
While in the zone, Blue Demon Jordan Lardani—taking up the reins of QB for an injured Tomasetti—connected a picture perfect pass to Torello score yet another Kennett TD. The extra point extended Kennett’s lead to 33-26.
The back and forth scoring from both teams was clearly due to aggressive offense and somewhat underpowered defense on both teams that night. “We wanted to be as balanced as we could offensively and we’ll take whatever we can get defensively,” Green said of the constant attack strategy of Kennett’s offensive line.
Then, as predicted, East came back to score yet another TD, only this time they edged out a lead, 33-34, with the extra point kick.
The sounds of nails being furiously bitten from the crowd were almost audible on the field. It was clear that the East team was not going down without a fight, and the Blue Demon’s had to act quickly in the middle of the fourth quarter if they were to emerge victorious.
The miracle came in the form of a Hail Mary, hurled by a recovered Tomasetti, to Rochester; the play resulting in an astonishing 40 yard gain from the 50 yard line. From the 10, Tomasetti connected with Torello for the TD and subsequent two-point conversion, solidifying a Kennett victory with barely two minutes left in the game.
“I credit the win to our offense, who worked hard,” Tomasetti said,” I feel that we also had some great blocking.”
Tomasetti also shared his thoughts about the Demons’ next game and the impact that this win will have on the team.
“I feel pretty good about it, we have a good offensive line and we can do it again, but, we can’t take this week off. We have to continue to focus.”
