Last-minute heroics

Schalick lives up to its season theme by finding a way to win, driving to score the winning TD against Gloucester City in the final minute

By Al Muskewitz
Riverview Sports News

PITTSGROVE – Kenai Simmons apologized for the quality of his voice as he talked about the game-winning drive, but it was that kind of game. It was one of those games that took all the encouragement he could muster to drive his team to victory.

Simmons capped a 59-yard drive with a 20-yard touchdown run with 56 seconds to play Friday night to give Schalick a dramatic 17-14 win over Gloucester City in the season opener for both teams.

The Cougars held the lead for most of the game until Gloucester scored on a 19-yard fourth-down pass with 4:38 left. The score came after Schalick had to punt from its end zone after its defense made two stops on the goal line, led by T.J. Hymer, to keep the Lions out of the end zone on the previous possession.

It would have been a tough way to lose considering the way the Cougars played all game against last year’s Central Jersey Group II finalist.

But Simmons, who just took over the quarterback job this season after not playing the position since youth football, flawlessly directed a seven-play drive to give Schalick back the lead. 

Nothing was going to keep him out of the end zone  He started the drive with a 24-yard pass to Dylan Sheehan. He moved the chains with an 8-yard gain on third down that looked like it was going nowhere off the snap. And then he slipped through a crowded backfield into open field on his go-ahead touchdown.

“I don’t think my words could explain how eager I was to  get in the end zone,” Simmons said. “We owed them one, No. 1, and we worked too hard for this to let them come back on us like that on our home turf.

“The way my team was pushing me around, like let’s go, we have this, we’ve got it in us. Before we started moving the ball down the field, I was like, OK, we’re on the same level right now and I like that. It encouraged me even more to get in there.” 

There was still some time on the clock, but the Cougars sealed it when kicker Hunter Dragotta drilled a rocket of a kickoff that bounced off the return man’s helmet and was recovered by Nylan Sutton at the 23.

Simmons took a knee twice and the Cougars had their victory in the longest running series in their program’s history.

“We’ve been preaching since the offseason and you’ll see it on our shirts, it’s called Find A Way To Win,” Cougars coach Mike Wilson said. “We told the kids it would take 48 minutes and play every play like it’s a new play and they did that tonight.

“They believed in themselves, they’ve been working hard and they truly found a way to win. We made some young mistakes tonight, but we persevered and found a way.”

Gloucester opened the game with an 80-yard touchdown drive, but Schalick answered with Levi Freeney-Childers’ 5-yard touchdown run and took the lead with Dragotta’s extra point. Dragotta also kicked a 32-yard field goal on the final play of the first half to give the Cougars a 10-6 halftime lead.

The kicker was setting up for a 29-yarder late in the third quarter that would have extended the Cougars lead, but a bad snap foiled the attempt.

Schalick controlled the ball in such a fashion Gloucester ran only 16 plays in the first half and 21 through three quarters.

Those last five plays were the start of the drive that Schalick eventually stuffed at the goal line. The Lions had gotten to the 1 on third down, but Hymer and his linemates stuffed Lions quarterback Jake Seibert twice.

“The center couldn’t push me around; I stood my ground and made sure I was playing,” Hymer said. “That’s probably the tiredest I’ve ever felt in a football game, but I knew I had to fight. I had to.

“I knew it was coming right to me because they thought they could bully us through the way they charged the ball down the field. Well, I stood up and made a stop. We made a stop. I knew that center was nervous, he had to get the push but didn’t, and I took it and ran with it. I didn’t come this far just to sit down and cry. I had to keep on pushing.”

Wilson considered taking a safety when his offense didn’t move the ball off the goal line, letting Dragotta kick it deep on the free kick and putting it in the hands of his defense from long range.

He did put it in the hands of defense, but from only 25 yards away as the Cougars punted from their end zone. They almost held the Lions there, but Gloucester scored its go-ahead touchdown against a broken coverage.

Schalick 17, Gloucester City 14

GLOU CITY (14)		SCHALICK (17)
11	1st Downs	13
21-111	Rushes-yds	38-134
5-9-2	Passes	5-5-0
91	Passing yds	34
3-2	Fum-Lost	0-0
0-0	Punts-avg	0-0
6-60	Penalties-yds	2-10

Gloucester City	6	0	0	8 —	14
Schalick	7	3	0	7 —	17

Scoring plays
GC – Jaden Garris 22 pass from Jake Seibert (kick failed), 4:52 1Q
S – Levi Freeney-Childers 5 run (Hunter Dragotta kick), 0:35 1Q
S – Hunter Dragotta 32 FG, 0:00 2Q
GC – Justin Frazer 19 pass from Jake Seibert (Jaden Garris pass from Jake Seibert), 4:38 4Q
S – Kenai Simmons 20 run (Hunter Dragotta kick) 0:56 4Q