Eagles beat Woodstown in overtime, Layfield passes for 300 yards in first career start at quarterback
FRIDAY’S WJFL SCORES
(Diamond, Independence Divisions)
Pennsville 28, Woodstown 21 (OT)
Schalick 63, Maple Shade 6
New Egypt 23, Buena 22
Deptford 30, Woodbury 6
| WHAT TO KNOW |
| Pennsville’s Tristan Horner scores go-ahead TD in OT, defense holds on through Woodstown’s attempt to match |
| Pennsville QB Jake Layfield passes for 320 yards and 3 touchdowns (0 INTs) in first start |
| Woodstown had won last 4 openers, had 5-game win streak in series, Healy beats them for first time since his first game as Eagles head coach |
By Al Muskewitz
Riverview Sports News
PENNSVILLE — Tristan Horner blasted in from the 2 at the start of overtime and Pennsville’s defense knocked away a fourth-down pass in the end zone to deny Woodstown’s bid to tie and outlasted the Wolverines 28-21 in a weather-delayed season-opener for both teams.
It was Pennsville coach Mike Healy’s first win over the Wolverines since his first game as the Eagles’ head coach in 2017.
“This was a monumental win,” Eagles defensive back Lucas Thomas said.
Indeed. The Wolverines had won the last five games in the series and seemingly had their way in everything in the rivalry the last couple years. This game originally was scheduled for Thursday night, but was postponed to Friday in the fallout of the day’s storms. It gave a handful of Pennsville players a chance to rewatch the 2023 playoff game between the teams together, firing them up even more for a game they’ve had circled on their calendars for a while.
“There’s no other game I wanted to win this year,” quarterback Jake Layfield said. “If we win one, I want it to be Woodstown. Between this and Homecoming. I don’t even care about Senior Night. It was just Woodstown. If anybody I wanted to beat it was Woodstown and we came out here and did it. There’s just no better feeling than beating a county rival.”
Both teams had chances to win the game that Healy said held “the highest of highs and lowest of lows.”.
Woodstown led 14-0 a minute into the second quarter and then 21-14 early in the fourth on Mason Middlemiss’ 33-yard run during which at least two officials’ whistles were heard when the Wolverines quarterback ran into traffic. Layfield brought the Eagles right back with three straight completions, highlighted by a 52-yard throw to C.J. Johnson and capped by a 15-yard scoring pass to Jacob Kimani.
The Eagles had the ball at the end of regulation, but Layfield’s pass to Johnson in the back of the end zone on the final play was incomplete.
Layfield completed 23 of 37 passes for 320 yards and three touchdowns with no interceptions in his first career start at quarterback. That would translate to a 161.6 NCAA passer rating. Johnson caught 11 balls for 196 yards and a touchdown in what he called “my wakeup game,” his indication of how the season is going to go..Kimani caught four for 68 and a score. Dante Cummings caught the other touchdown pass
“We have 72 plays on the wrist band and all three of those plays (on the tying drive) are plays we don’t normally run,” Layfield said. “Coach (Ryan) Wood says it in the headset and we’ll run it on to the field. I feel like sometimes you kind of just know when things are going to go well.
“Kimani was telling me, we watched film on them and someone caught a 10-yard in, and he said if I ever catch a ball over the middle in the end zone I’m going to dunk it on the goalpost. I think he forgot to dunk it on the goalpost and got hit pretty hard.
“Sometimes you just know when you’ve got two guys who know they can go up and get the ball the confidence is there. The line was giving me time. CJ, dawg on the outside, he was there for me all game, and then Kimani just finishing in the end zone. I knew he would win the route.”
Pennsville got the ball first in overtime and needed just two plays to score and take their first lead of the game. Layfield hit Kimani for 23 yards and then Horner punched it in.
“We were pretty efficient in the passing game today so that’s what we wanted to start it with,” Healy said. “We felt those fourth down stops early in the game we actually had the opportunity for the first down but one or two little things (got in the way), so we felt good going with that play. Tristan ran hard, ran into contact. Coach Wood always tells the kids ‘run through the smoke.’ He did it and got in the end zone .”
Woodstown’s bid to tie got off to a balky start with a holding penalty on its first snap. The Wolverines fumbled but recovered the next play. Thomas stopped Cole Ware for a 2-yard gain on the next play and then Middlemiss threw incomplete on third down.
On the final play of the game, Middlemiss rolled right and found Ware in the end zone, but Thomas, Danny Knight and David Biddle converged on the receiver to knock the ball free and seal the victory
“Honestly, the best thing about it was how we all swarmed to it,” Thomas said. “The QB was rolling out, we already knew it was a pass play –they had to get in the end zone — and we just put our best players in the right positions and broke down the pass. It was the best feeling in the world. I honestly just wanted to lay down there on the ground for a second, that was the best feeling, but I wanted to celebrate with my boys so I was running around the field.”
In the early going it was Pennsville that struggled on fourth down. The Wolverines denied them three times on the make-or-break down in consecutive possessions in the first half and scored their second touchdown of the game on a fourth-down Middlemiss pass to Andrew White to take a 14-0 lead. They also had four sacks between Rax Hannah and Xavier Csazar in the second quarter to disrupt the Eagles even more.
“I was happy with how we played in the first half; we’ve just got to be able to put a full game together,” Woodstown coach Frank Trautz said. “I know it’s an old saying, but it is what it is. You can’t just win on a half of football. We had too many busted coverages and missed assignments and things like that that came back to bite us.”
| WHS | PMHS | |
| 9 | First downs | 11 |
| 27-137 | Rushing-yards | 21-13 |
| 6-11-2 | Passing (C-A-I) | 23-37-0 |
| 54 | Passing yards | 320 |
| 3-0 | Fumbles-lost | 2-1 |
| 3-26.0 | Punts-average | 1-36.0 |
| 5-55 | Penalties-yards | 4-30 |
| Woodstown (0-1) | 7 | 7 | 0 | 7 | 0- | 21 |
| Pennsville (1-0) | 0 | 6 | 8 | 7 | 7- | 28 |
SCORING SUMMARY
WO-Mason Middlemiss 14 run (Jack Bucksar kick), 4:44 1Q
WO-Andrew White 28 pass from Mason Middlemiss (Jack Bucksar kick), 11:01 2Q
P-CJ Johnson 33 pass from Jake Layfield (kick failed), 1:01 2Q
P-Dante Cummings 3 pass from Jake Layfield (Lucas Thomas run), 6:45 3Q
WO-Mason Middlemiss 33 run (Jack Bucksar kick), 10:41 4Q
P-Jake Kimani 15 pass from Jake Layfield (Dante Cummings kick), 8:56 4Q
P-Tristan Horner 2 run (Dante Cummings kick), OT
Riverview Sports News 