When first-year sophomores find themselves in situations like the one Tyrone quarterback Leonard Wilson was in Saturday against Bishop Guilfoyle, it’s usually not a good thing.
Wilson, in his first season as the Golden Eagles’ starting quarterback, struggled against a Marauders secondary that double-teamed deep sideline routes and made successful plays off Tyrone’s patented play-action all but impossible. In 11 attempts, Wilson had just three completions and two interceptions.
But by the fourth quarter, with Tyrone trailing 14-10, he was being asked to lead his team from its own 35-yard line into scoring position with just 4:06 to work with.
What did he do in those four minutes? Nothing special. He simply caught the game winning touchdown on a perfectly placed halfback pass from Brice Mertiff – Wilson’s first varsity score – and then sealed the win with his first varsity interception as Tyrone defeated the Marauders 17-14 in a non-conference game at Mansion Park.
Tyrone improved to 5-1 – its best start since 2000 – heading into this week’s Big 8 Conference showdown with Philipsburg-Osceola on Homecoming at Gray Veterans Memorial Field. The Marauders, meanwhile, who just two weeks ago were unbeaten and riding a 19-game regular-season winning streak, fell to 4-2, and now face small school power Pius X this week.
“He’s a competitor,” Tyrone coach John Franco said of Wilson, who in the fall of his sophomore year has already earned varsity letters in basketball, track and field and now football. “He just keeps coming at you. A lot of kids would get down in that situation, but he had a resolve to come back and make plays.”
It’s good for the Eagles that he did because for much of the game the Marauders’ vaunted defense, which led the area going into the game surrendering just over seven points per game, had bottled up Tyrone’s big money plays and playmakers.
Junior running back Brice Mertiff got his usual numbers – 27 carries, 127 yards, one touchdown – but he was able to break free from the pack only sporadically, and Tyrone’s bread and butter yard-gainers – the option, sweep and play action pass – often went nowhere. The Golden Eagles turned the ball over four times, all in the first half, and found difficulty sustaining drives.
Tyrone’s saving grace was its own stingy defense, which limited the powerful rushing tandem of seniors Josh DeStefano and Matt Georgiana to 107 yards combined and held BG to just 90 yards rushing as a team. In all, the Eagles registered 16 plays for zero or negative yards and completely corralled Georgiana, who came in averaging over 100 yards per game, keeping him to a mere 32 yards on 14 carries.
“I thought coming in this would be a defensive struggle,” said Franco. “We knew they would be tough and we knew there wouldn’t be many touchdowns scored. Our defense played very well, and they really saved our butts. Playing pretty poorly on offense, we still found a way to win.”
They did it with a controversial call that left Guilfoyle fans grumbling.
With just over four minutes to play, Tyrone moved the ball from its own 35 to the BG 36 in seven plays. But the drive stalled there, and on fourth-and-seven Wilson threw to Tommy Crowl deep down the sideline with 1:46 to play.
The pass was intercepted by Simon Littlejohn, but he was flagged for interfering with Crowl on a jump-ball pass, giving Tyrone new life at the Guilfoyle 21-yard line. On the next play, Mertiff took a sweep right and passed back to Wilson across the field. Wilson out-leaped Mark Sprouse for the ball at the goal line and fell into the endzone for what proved to be the game-winner.
“We knew they ran a lot of ‘cover zero,’ which is man-to-man coverage with no safety,” said Franco. “When you do that no one covers the quarterback. We anticipated it and practiced for it and it worked well.”
Still Franco would rather his team not find itself needing that kind of play to win a game, but because the Eagles had trouble keeping possession of the ball throughout a large part of the first half, they did.
On their opening possession, the Golden Eagles advanced from their own 29 to the BG 35 in just two plays after Wilson connected with Crowl for a 34-yard completion on the first play of the game. But on second down, Wilson’s option pitch to Mertiff went to the ground and Guilfoyle recovered.
Tyrone held the Marauders to three plays and a punt, but on the Eagles’ first play following the possession change Mertiff fumbled and Guilfoyle scooped it up at the Tyrone 16.
Two running plays later, Georgiana chugged in from the five giving the Marauders a 7-0 lead.
Tyrone finally got on the board on its first series of the second quarter with an eight-play, 65-yard drive that consumed four minutes. On third-and-five from the BG 34, Mertiff started left, dodged several tackles in traffic, and sprinted 34 yards for the game-tying touchdown.
Freshman Matt Morrow recovered a fumble on the fourth play of Guilfoyle’s ensuing possession, and Tyrone used it to springboard itself into the lead. Following the turnover, the Eagles took over at BG’s 39-yard line, and after four Mertiff carries netted 24 yards, junior Ben Gummo came on to boot a 22-yard field goal, his third of the season, giving Tyrone a 10-7 lead at the half.
The Marauders reclaimed the lead in the third quarter with a three-minute, six play drive that covered 52 yards. The drive was boosted when Guilfoyle coach Tom Irwin went for it on fourth-and-one from the Tyrone 46. Georgiana responded with a two-yard blast to keep the drive alive, and two plays later Destafano scampered 36 yards to put the Marauders ahead 14-10.
The lead held until Tyrone’s last possession, and Wilson was able to make Tyrone’s lead stick when he picked off an Adam Trybus pass that sailed high on BG’s final series.
After the game, Franco deflected questions concerning the anticipated coaching matchup between he and Irwin, who coached Franco as a player at Guilfoyle in the 1970s and coached with Franco at Guilfoyle in the 1980s.
“It was a very emotional week for me, but it’s not about Tom or me,” Franco said. “It’s about our kids hanging in there and finding a way to win when they hadn’t played very well.”
GRID TIDBITS: Max Soellner registered one solo sack and assisted on another lifting his team leading total to 10.5….the throwback play that resulted in the game-winning score should be a familiar one for Tyrone fans. It worked to tie a PIAA playoff game between Tyrone and Sharon in 2000 when Jesse Jones threw complete to Brandon Hoover, and it failed last season against Bellwood-Antis when the Eagles were trying to tie a 17-15 game with a two-point conversion….Tyrone’s four turnovers were its most since Week 6 of 2002, when the Eagles turned the ball over seven times against Pius X in a 25-21 loss.
Tyrone 17, Bishop Guilfoyle 14
Score by quarter
Tyrone – 0 10 0 7 – 28
Bishop Guilfoyle – 7 0 7 0 – 14
Scoring
First Quarter
BG – Georgiana 5 run, (Finelli kick) 8:33
Second Quarter
T – Mertiff 34 run. (Gummo kick) 7:43
T – Gummo 22 Field Goal 4:01
Third Quarter
BG – DeStefano 37 run (Finelli kick) 3:33
Fourth Quarter
T – L. Wilson 21 pass from Mertiff (Gummo kick) 1:23
Team Statistics
T BG
First Downs 10 6
Rushes 40 31
Rush yards 175 90
Passing att. 4-12 3-8
Pass yards 89 26
Int. by 1 2
Fumbles/rec 3/2 2/1
Penalties 3-22 6-65
Punts 4-34.3 7-37.4
Total Yards 264 116
Individual Statistics
Rushing
Tyrone: Mertiff 22-127 1 TD, Mingle 1-3, Gummo 8-18, Wilson 8-31, Christine 3-10 Crabtree 1-(-4).
Bishop Guilfoyle: DeStefano 12-75 (1TD), Georgiana 14-32, Sprouse 2-(-4), Trybus 3- (-13).
Passing
Tyrone: Wilson 3-11 68 yards, 0 TDs, 2 Int.
Bishop Guilfoyle: Trybus 3-8 26 yards 0 TD, 1 Int.
Receiving
Tyrone: Soellner 2-24, Crowl 1-44, L. Wilson 1-21 (1TD).
Bishop Guilfoyle: Zimmerman 2-20, Milliron 1-6.
