Bellwood-Antis will host Juniata Valley at Bellwood Memorial Stadium on Saturday night at 7 p.m. in a first round District VI-A playoff game.
Mike Smith has compiled quite a record in a very short time in his two years as the head football coach at Juniata Valley High School. Using speed, quickness, speed and even more speed, the Hornets won their first 10 games in 2004, including the first undefeated regular season in a long time. Their fairy tale-season looked like it was going to continue into the District VI-A championship game, when Valley jumped out to a quick 14-0 lead over Bellwood-Antis in the semifinal.
Then however, the wheels fell off. Bellwood-Antis and coach John Hayes got a score of their own before halftime to slice the margin in half, and proceeded to control the entire second half. After 35 unanswered points and a 35-14 victory, it was the Blue Devils and not Juniata Valley who moved on.
In 2005, Coach Smith and company started right back up in mid-season multi-scoring, limiting defense frame, without so much as a stitch out of place. West Branch was humbled 49-0 in the opener and Glendale followed suit 54-0.
In week three however, Juniata Valley ran into a speed bump, actually more like a gigantic chasm in the form of the Southern Huntingdon Rockets, who took the Hornets apart 37-6.
Juniata Valley (8-1) got right back up from that spanking and ran the table starting with a 48-6 triumph over Claysburg, then following with wins over Northern Bedford 28-3, Tussey Mountain 66-0, Moshannon Valley 34-0, Williamsburg 54-7 and Mount Union 52-14 to finish the regular season 8-1 and the sixth seed in the Class-A playoffs.
Valley has rushed for 2,340 yards in 335 rushes to average 6.99 yards a carry and has thrown 69 passes, completing 38 for an additional 673 yards. Juniata Valley has averaged 335 yards in total offense per game in 2005.
In averaging 43.4 points per game, the Hornets have been led by quick-strike speedsters Tyler Hall (Sr. 5-11, 170) who has rushed 48 times for 597 yards and 15 touchdowns, and Corey Lightner (Sr. 6-0, 165), with 373 yards and six TDs on 24 carries. Senior running back Johnny Boyd (6-0, 190) leads the team in rushing with 828 yards and 16 scores on 123 carries. Boyd averages a stellar 6.7 yards per carry, but speed merchants Hall and Lightner average 12.4 and 15.5 respectively every time their number is called.
Juniata Valley lost 2004 starting quarterback Dan Beatty, who ripped Blue Devil defenses for 175 first-half yards and two TD passes, in last year’s meeting. Junior Nathan Burkey (5-10, 175) got the nod to take over for Beatty and completed 27 of 51 tosses for 444 yards with two TD passes and three interceptions before getting injured against Tussey Mountain. Sophomore Zack Boyd (6-0, 165) stepped in and quarterbacked the Hornets in their last three games, completing nine of 15 passes for 195 yards with no interceptions and one TD pass. Both should be healthy on Saturday.
Lightner is the Hornets’ leading receiver with 19 catches for 272 yards and two TDs and Hall adds eight catches for 225 yards and two TDs.
“Juniata Valley runs a version of the Wing-T, but have adapted a new Jet-style since Coach Smith became the head coach,” said Bellwood-Antis coach Hayes. “They take advantage of their speed, run a lot of misdirection. They are real quick to the perimeter. Defenses have to run pretty quickly to catch up to their speed and then become susceptible to reverses and counters. They are a good football team that takes advantage of their tremendous team speed.”
Juniata Valley and Bellwood-Antis began their 25-game series with Hornet wins in both 1959 and 1960, and the series was tied 6-6 after the first 12 matchups. Bellwood-Antis however, has taken 10 of the last dozen games to jump out to a 16-9 series lead, including last year’s 35-14 win.
“The Juniata Valley defense creates a lot of positive situations for their offense,” said Hayes. “Their defense looks a lot like a 4-3, but they will roll a linebacker up to the tight end side, or step a linebacker down into the line to create an overload and blitz through that to try to create difficult situations for the opposing offense.”
The Hornet defense has allowed just 7.5 points per game, and 107 yards total offense. Opponents have run for 728 yards (80.9/game) and passed for 235 yards (26.1/game). In their eight wins, Valley has limited their opposition to just a combined total of 30 points.
Bellwood-Antis (8-1) with eight straight wins since a season opening loss to Tyrone, enters district playoffs for the sixth time in the last seven years and eighth time in the last 12 seasons, having reached the district final game in 1985, ‘88, ‘93, ‘94, ‘97, ‘99. 2000, ‘01 and ‘04, with championships in 1988, 1997 and 2004.
The Blue Devils have rushed for 2,224 yards and passed for an additional 934 yards, averaging 247 yards rushing and 106 passing per game for a total offense figure of 353 yards per contest.
Josh Kleinfelter has rushed 222 times for 1,599 yards and 23 touchdowns for the Blue Devils. Kleinfelter needs 55 yards to pass Don ‘Booker” Moore for the single season B-A rushing record of 1,653 yards in 1985. Josh has also caught six passes for 195 yards and two TDs, to total 25 TDs, tying Kleinfelter with Dave Miller (2000) for third place on the B-A list and only Chris McCartney (26 in 1990) and Moore (28 in 1985) have more. Kleinfelter took over the total yardage career leader last week, passing McCartney’s total of 3,419 (1988-90) and now has 3,660 total yards (rushing-passing-receiving). Josh also passed McCartney (3,170) in career rushing yardage as well with a current total of 3,219 yards.
Jon Davila has rushed 35 times for 186 yards and one score, Brandon Eger has 174 yards and three TDs on 32 carries and Devon Clapper has run 24 times for 1723 yards and three TDs.
Kyle Drost has completed 46 of 97 passes for 887 yards with nine TDs and six interceptions. Drost is currently seventh on the B-A ladder in passing yardage and is one of just six B-A passers to have more TD passes than interceptions. Chuck Benton did it twice (2000-01). With a career total of 1,315 yards passing, the B-A senior is sixth overall.
Dan Kovac has caught 17 passes for 396 yards and eight TDs to lead all B-A receivers. Kovac has taken over the career mark for receiving yardage in a game (167 against Philipsburg-Osceola), receiving yardage in a career (699 yards) and career TD passes caught (10) and is tied with Steve Miller for TD passes caught in a season.
Devon Clapper has 12 catches for 167 yards and Troy Brunner has nine catches for 103 yards.
Kleinfelter leads the team in scoring with 25 TDs for 150 points. Kovac has 10 TDs for 60 points and Evan Celmo has booted 38 PATs and three field goals for 47 points.
Celmo booted his first 38 PATs in a row before missing his final two kicks on Saturday against BG. Celmo has kicked a total of 71 PATs and now ranks third in career extra points behind Chris Miller (88 in 1998-00) and Dan Graham (85 in ‘00-02). Evan is also third in PATs in a season behind Graham (52 in 2001) and Miller (46 in 2000).
The Blue Devils have been allowing opponents an average of 85 yards rushing, and are fresh off limiting Bishop Guilfoyle to a MINUS 29 yards on 28 carries and 95 yards passing.
The Blue Devils will line up on Saturday with Kyle Drost under at quarterback, Josh Kleinfelter at tailback, Jon Davila at fullback and Devon Clapper at wingback. Dan Kovac will line up at wide receiver, with Troy Brunner at tight end. Josh Peters is the center, Anthony Jenkins and Adam Martin are the tackles and Brian Dougherty and Tony DelGrosso are the guards.
On defense, Brunner and Jenkins are the ends, Martin and Tyler Narehood at the tackles, DelGrosso and Evan Hughes are the inside linebackers, Blaze Winterstein and Kovac are the outsider linebackers, Kleinfelter and Clapper are the cornerbacks and Brandon Pruznak is the safety.
