Generals’ late touchdown sends Lee reeling

LEE – The home team (1-2) fought back most of the game to tie Pittsfield in the fourth quarter, who dominated the line of scrimmage from start to finish, before succumbing on a 69-yard touchdown pass by Chris Slade to Devon Tucker with 5:06 to play.

“Games are won on the line of scrimmage, and we knew going in that they were going to create a challenge for us up front,” said Lee Head Coach Keith Thomson. “At the end of the day their line did a better job than we did and they controlled the line of scrimmage most of the night.”

Slade, who avoided a blitz with a nifty move on third and long, found the speedster Tucker for his second touchdown on the night to end a tremendous momentum swing by the Wildcats.

Lee, who had trailed the entire game, turned the tides when Zach DiSantis forced and recovered a fumble on the Generals’ 12-yard line with 8:33 left in the fourth quarter.

Three plays later, Deaglan Giarolo found Nick Sitzer for the second time of the night on a nine-yard pass. Lee added the two-point conversion when Giarolo found Jared Kirchner in the back of the end zone to complete the comeback with 6:37 left.

Pittsfield misplayed the first play from scrimmage on the following possession, then Lee defensive back Ryan Hurley made a great open-field tackle for no gain, forcing a long third down situation for the Generals.

Pittsfield called a timeout to set up their next play, where Slade found Tucker down the sideline for the winning score.

“The really disappointing part of that play is that we had momentum, but we didn’t execute,” Thomson said. “There were some blown assignments on that play. We should have had a guy close in that gap and we didn’t do it.”

Tucker opened the scoring for the Generals in the first quarter with a 46-yard run, to put his team up 8-0 after the two-point conversion.

The Wildcats struggled to move the ball on offense due to the size and strength of the Generals’ front four.

“We would like to be more consistent in the running game. In two out of three games, we have had some runs we are happy about but we weren’t able to string enough together to play,” Thomson said. “It’s something we are working on – we got to be able to run the football.”

The Wildcats’ most successful play from scrimmage came on their only first-half scoring drive, when Giarolo found Sitzer for a 37-yard touchdown pass on a fourth down misdirection screen pass.

“We put that play in specifically for Pittsfield, we had eight different screen passes we practiced, and that was one we worked on that we thought would be a big hitter for us,” Thomson said. “The idea was to neutralize their push up front.”

Pittsfield moved to 1-2 overall, as the Wildcats look to regroup before Friday’s night game versus Taconic.

“One of the things we took [from the Pittsfield game]: we took a real positive [from] our guys that we didn’t quit,” Thomson said. “They fought and they came up with some big plays.”

Against Taconic, the Wildcats will have to contend with running back Trayvon Sims, who has the potential to take it the distance every time he touches the ball.

“We will have a similar approach to Tucker of Pittsfield, if we seal the edge – we like our chances,” Thomson added.

Posted by Tim Davis on September 27, 2012. Filed under High School Sports,Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry