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Tigers tame Toronto

THROUGH THE AIR — Toronto’s Thomas Fordham gains ground after catching a pass during the first half of Friday’s game with visiting Shadyside. (Mike Mathison)

TORONTO — Shadyside continued its reign over Toronto with a thrilling 31-30 victory against the Red Knights on their homecoming weekend. The Tigers had to fight back from an early 12-point deficit to score the deciding touchdown with 7:01 to play in the fourth quarter.

In a battle of unbeatens, Shadyside had the last laugh and continued its longstanding win streak over Toronto.

“The man upstairs happened to touch us with the wand tonight,” said Tigers head coach Mark Holenka, “that’s all it was.”

Shadyside (5-0) flipped the script in the fourth quarter, making up that two-touchdown hole, by scoring 12 unanswered points. The winning touchdown was set up when Austin Price recovered a fumble on the ensuing kickoff after the Tigers closed the gap to 30-25 at the 9:30 mark of the fourth.

Price’s recovery gave Shadyside the ball at the 50-yard line.

Five plays later, the Tigers were in the end zone. Billy Johnson ran in from five yards out to close the scoring.

But it wasn’t won yet.

Toronto (4-1) regained possesion on its own 28-yard line and 6:56 left. After converting a third-and-four, the Red Knights were stalled on the fresh set of downs. Facing a fourth-and-eight on the 48, Red Knights quarterback Nate Karaffa hit Ty West with a low pass for positive yards. After a measurement, though, Toronto came up a half yard short of the first down.

Shadyside took over with 4:15 remaining in regulation.

Still, it wasn’t won yet.

The Tigers ran eight successful plays over the next four minutes, draining the clock and gaining two first downs on third-down attempts. The final nail in the coffin was a nine-yard pass from Johnson to Price on a fourth-and-four with 59 seconds to play.

“Momentum is just a tough thing to defend,” Holenka said. “Even after that fumble on the kickoff, it was tough to keep up but we did it. We did a nice job that we didn’t have to go back out on defense with around five minutes to play.

“We had to pass the ball to do it. Those were the big plays. We knew they were risky calls, but that’s what we had to do to win it. I credit all the offensive coaches. They got the job done today.”

To mount the comeback, the Tigers had to start passing the ball in the first half. In the team’s first score, Johnson completed six of seven passes on an 11-play drive capped off by a one-yard run by Alex Krupa. Krupa, who finished with 31 yards on 16 carries, was limited for much of the second half due to a leg bruise.

Johnson added 61 yards on 14 carries on the ground. He was 18 of 29 passing for 255 yards. Johnson hit both Gregg Quinn and Colton Stutzman five times as those receivers finished with 60 and 55 yards, respectively.

“He’s on one leg,” Holenka said. “He did a heck of a job back there. We realized that if we wanted to win, we’d even have to run Billy more. He rose up and accepted the challenge. We felt it wasn’t over yet, so we had to give it a go.”

Even after an interception by Shadyside’s Kelly Hendershot on Toronto’s next drive, the Red Knights still took a 12-7 lead into the locker room at halftime.

The third quarter was a back-and-forth chess match as the Red Knights received the ball and scored on their first possession of the second half. Max Tice had a 28-yard run on the first play, then ran for a 15-yard score on the fourth play of that first drive to give his team a 20-7 advantage after a successful passing conversion.

Shadyside answered with a 54-yard touchdown run by Connor Banco, closing the gap to 20-13. On that Tigers’ drive, which only took two plays, they were aided by an offside penalty on Toronto, the Red Knights’ first infraction of the game. It came at the 9:33 mark of the third, then Shadyside scored with 9:23 remaining in the quarter.

Following suit, the Red Knights scored on their next possession as Danny Zdinak capped a 10-play drive with a 30-yard field goal, to give Toronto a 23-13 lead with 4:13 left in the third.

Shadyside’s next possesion ended with a punt, as did the ensuing drive for the Red Knights.

The Tigers were able to break out and get back on the board when Johnson found Chase Wade for a 34-yard touchdown pass in the first minute of the fourth quarter. Shadyside was inching closer, down just 23-19.

Toronto responded right away when Tice broke three tackles and spun his way from midfield to the end zone for a 69-yard touchdown run on the only play of the team’s ensuing drive. The Red Knights seemed to be pulling away, now, with a 30-19 advantage with 11:10 remaining.

Shadyside continued the charge, though, and scored on its next drive which lasted just under three minutes and took 80 yards to complete as Johnson hooked up with Wade again. This passing score flew 31 yards and brought the score to 30-25 before the Tigers were able to recover the fumble on the kickoff and come back down to take and secure the win.

“It was a fantastic football game,” said Toronto head coach Eric Meek. “Both teams played very hard and it came down to one point. There were some turnovers and they ended up being costly.”

Toronto got on the board first in the closing minute of the first quarter on an 11-yard run by Karaffa. The Red Knights scored on their next possession thanks to a 51-yard pass from Karaffa to a streaking Jake Keenan. The 12-0 lead for the hosts was established with 11:40 to go in the second quarter.

Toronto’s Dylan Warren recovered a Shadyside fumble to set up that second score. Warren also recorded a quarterback sack, as did Thomas Fordham and Tice. Joe O’Brien had three sacks for the Red Knights.

“The first half, we laid the ball down a few times and Toronto is too good of a team to do that for,” Holenka said. “It looked like we were sleep-walking in the first half. The pep coming out of the huddle that we usually see just wasn’t there early on. It was like we needed to take some type of energy pill to wake up there. In the second half, they came to play.”

For Toronto, Karaffa completed 8 of 15 passes for 141 yards. Ty West was the top receiver with four catches for 67 yards.

The Red Knights outgained the Tigers on the ground, 218-203 as Tice finished with 142 yards on 11 carries and Karaffa added 76 yards on 14 carries.

Banco led the Shadyside ground attack with 90 yards on just five carries.

Next week, Shadyside has another undefeated opponent in River, which defeated Galena Columbus, 32-14. Toronto heads to Conotton Valley, which knocked off Bridgeport, 20-14.

“We’ve got to get better,” Meek said. “We’ve got to regroup, which we will. You can’t lay in bed and keep the covers over your head. You’ve got to get up in the morning, get back to work, correct your mistakes and do what you have to do to get better for the next game.”

Shadyside 31, Toronto 30

Shadyside                             0  7    6  18  —  31

Toronto                                 6  6  11    7  —  30

T: Karaffa 5 run (kick missed)

T: Keenan 51 pass from Karaffa (kick missed)

S: Krupa 1 run (Hawthorne kick)

T: Tice 15 (pass conversion good)

S: Banco 54 run (conversion failed)

T: Zdinak 30 field goal

S: Wade 34 pass from Johnson (conversion failed)

T: Tice 69 run (Zdinak kick)

S: Wade 31 pass from Johnson (conversion failed)

S: Johnson 5 run (conversion failed)

RUSHING: Shadyside 39-203 (Banco 5-90, Johnson 14-61, Krupa 16-31, Quinn 1-10). Toronto 27-218 (Tice 11-142, Karaffa 14-76, Fordham 1-0, Zdinak 1-0).

PASSING: Shadyside 16-29-118-2-0 (all by Johnson). Toronto 8-15-141-1-1 (all by Karaffa).

RECEIVING: Shadyside 16-118 (Quinn 5-60, Stutzman 5-55, Wade 4-98, Hendershot 2-14). Toronto 8-141 (West 4-67, Fordham 2-28, Keenan 1-38, Zdinak 1-8).

FIRST DOWNS: Shadyside 21, Toronto 14.

FUMBLES-LOST: Shadyside 2-1, Toronto 3-1.

PENALTIES-YARDS: Shadyside 6-50, Toronto 5-30.

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