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By Nate Oxman
WYNCOTE - Upper Moreland appeared to be doomed for a devastating defeat.
Trailing 22-20 to host Cheltenham Friday night, the Golden Bears were about to punt the ball back to Panthers with just over nine minutes left to play.
On the previous Panthers’ possession, they moved the ball 53 yards and into the red zone on 11 plays, including two key third-down conversions.
But with the ball at the 14-yard line, the Bears’ defense came up with four straight stops to hand the ball back to the offense. A lengthy, clock-eating drive was all that was needed to spoil the Panthers’ senior night.Instead, stud senior running back Chris Smallwood – who racked up a season-high 280 yards on 32 carries including three touchdowns on the night – and the Bears’ offense sputtered and were forced into the aforementioned punt.
That’s when the snap soared over the head of punter Ronye Dennis, who scooped it up only to be pulled down at the Bears’ 1-yard line.
A touchdown would turn the Panthers’ slim edge into a two-score cushion.
All they needed was one measly yard.
They didn’t get it.
The Panthers’ four straight runs ran right into a stone wall of Bears at the line of scrimmage. The last attempt, by star senior running back Damin Finley (114 yards, 30 carries) turned the ball back over to the Bears with 6:54 to play.
“We just couldn’t think about it and play like it didn’t happen,” said junior linebacker Greg Adamson of the defense’s mentality on the possession. “They weren’t going to score.”
“We didn’t finish,” said Cheltenham coach Joe Gro. “We didn’t finish. It’s as simple as that. They played good defense and we made some bad decisions”
After the Bears took over, 11 Smallwood carries for 77 yards, interrupted by a mammoth 24-yard Mike Sawick completion to Dennis on a third-and-2, moved the Bears 99 yards in 5:33 to seal a 28-22 Suburban One American Conference win.
“We talked about it all week,” said Upper Moreland Coach Adam Beach, whose team improved to 5-3 overall, 3-2 in SOL American play with the win. “We’ve got to stay positive. We’ve got to pick each other up. That’s something we really wanted to focus on this year. [Two weeks ago] against Wissahickon we came out, they got up on us at halftime. … But they came out and they responded and [in the second half] in the Wissahickon game they played well and then we talked about it today that it was going to take 48 minutes.
“If someone makes a mistake, we’ve got to pick him up in the right way because we’re going to need him later. We made some mistakes out here. We blew some coverages. We snapped the ball over the kid’s head. But they kept fighting and they kept playing together. And that’s why I think we won the game.”The Panthers (3-6 overall, 2-3 SOL American) put a scare into the Upper Moreland faithful following the go-ahead score when receiver Justin Ferguson slid on his knees to snag a deep Kenneth Cropper pass for 40 yards that pushed the ball to the Bears 14-yard line. But on the very next play when Cropper dropped back, Adamson stormed through the line for a sack to end the ball game.
“We just didn’t think about losing,” said Adamson of that last series. “We just did what we could and tried to stop them.”
The stop gave the Bears their second straight come-from-behind conference victory after rallying from 17 points down two weeks ago to win at Wissahickon, 34-17.
While Finley, who was coming off a dismantling of Upper Dublin’s defense in the Panthers’ 32-28 upset victory one week ago, did more than his fair share of damage to the Bears defense, it was a big-play aerial attack that put the Panthers in front in the first half.
After the Bears struck first by way of a 2-yard Smallwood score with 6:08 to play in the first quarter, the Panthers pulled even at 8-8 courtesy of a Finley pass.
He took a handoff from Cropper and tucked the ball as though he was going to turn up field only to stop in his tracks and launch a perfect bomb to a streaking Dan Rouse.
Rouse had the Bears’ top cover corner Dennis beat, ran under the football, hauled it in, and raced the rest of the way untouched for a 67-yard score.Upper Moreland answered emphatically on the ensuing possession, where Dennis was able to get some revenge, slipping past Rouse and the rest of the Panthers’ coverage for a 25-yard touchdown reception and a 14-8 Bears lead.
The back-and-forth scoring continued when Cropper connected with Rouse on a 23-yard pass that, with the point-after, put the Panthers in front 15-14.
Then, after the Bears went three and out, the Panthers piled on another score through the air after a gutsy call by Gro.
After a 48-yard Cropper pass to Rouse, followed a few plays later by a 22-yard Finley run helped push the ball to the UM 5-yard line, the Panthers faced a fourth-and-goal with 18 seconds to play in the first half.
Instead of attempting a short field goal, the Panthers’ decision to go for it paid off when Cropper hit tight end Jonathan Tsipori in the back of the end zone to stretch their lead to 22-14 at the break.
“He did a couple of really wonderful things,” said Gro of Cropper, his maturing sophomore signal-caller. “There were some excellent reads. He made some nice things happen.”
Cropper, Finley and company moved the Panthers to the UM 14 before the Bears came up with another big fourth-down stop – number two of three in all in the second half – to stall the Panthers’ drive.
And even though the ensuing possession led to the errant snap that nearly slammed the door shut, the Bears were able to muster one final stand to set up a remarkable win.
NOTES: The win keeps the Bears' SOL American title hopes, as well as their District One Class AAA playoff hopes, alive. The Bears currently are in second place in the conference behind Norristown and Upper Dublin, both of which are 4-1. A win over Norristown on Friday at home at 7 p.m., combined with a Wissahickon win over Upper Dublin could mean a three-way tie for the title.
A win over Norristown could also mean locking up a spot in the eight-team district playoffs. The Bears entered Friday's game in ninth place, but they're destined to move up after Upper Perkiomen (sixth place), Academy Park (seventh place) and West Chester Henderson (eighth place) all suffered losses on Friday night.
Upper Moreland 8 6 6 8—28
Cheltenham 0 22 0 0—22
First quarter
UM—Smallwood 2 run (Smallwood run), 6:08
Second quarter
CH—Rouse 67 pass from Finley (Finley run), 10:57
UM—Dennis 25 pass from Sawick (kick blocked), 8:10
CH—Rouse 23 pass from Cropper (Stuetz kick), 4:17
CH—Tsipori 5 pass from Cropper (Stuetz kick), 0:13
Third quarter
UM—Smallwood 60 run (conversion failed), 5:07
Fourth quarter
UM—Smallwood 3 run (Sawick run), 1:21
Rushing
Upper Moreland: Smallwood 32-280, 3 TDS; Adamson 1-3
Cheltenham: Finley 30-114; Gary 6-21; Lester 2-7; Cropper 5-(-7)
Passing
Upper Moreland: Sawick 4-12-0 73, TD
Cheltenham: Cropper 9-14-0 156, 2 TDs; Finley 1-1-0 67, TD
Receiving
Upper Moreland: Dennis 3-60, TD; Lockard 1-13
Cheltenahm: Rouse 6-170, 2 TDs; Ferguson 1-40; Finley 1-8; Tsipori 1-5, TD.
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