Back for its 17th season, the popular Intelligencer/Bucks County Courier Times ‘Let’s Talk Football’ features football beat writer Drew Markol. To stay on top of the high school football news in the area, visit the Intelligencer (http://www.theintell.com/sports/high-school/) and Courier Times (http://www.buckscountycouriertimes.com/sports/high-school/) web sites
SuburbanOneSports.com: Pennridge scored a late touchdown to defeat Central Bucks West 14-7 in a marquee SOL contest. Your thoughts.
Drew Markol: “I thought West would win a close one. It was a close one. Pennridge took a 7-0 lead in the closing seconds of the first half, West tied the score early in the fourth quarter, and Pennridge – on the last drive of the game – went 85 yards, and Aiden Tetkowski, the junior quarterback, threw a pass to Sean Leuthe, who’s been a three-year starter for Pennridge at defensive back and receiver and is a really good player and one of the few senior starters – he catches it and takes it 36 yards for a touchdown with about 40 seconds to go, and Pennridge wins the game to go 4-0.
“Obviously, at this point, 4-0 teams are one of the stories of the year, but the fact that Pennridge is 4-0 is really, really something, considering how much they lost to graduation and is basically playing juniors and sophomores on this team with just a handful of senior starters. For Pennridge, Nate Derstine – a very good emerging wide receiver – didn’t even play in that game. He had gotten hurt against Council Rock South, so he was out, and he’s probably their best receiver. For them to go to 4-0 after making the district final last year and winning the National Conference – they have to play a pretty good CB East team on Friday, but they have done a really good job, no question about it.
“Both West and Pennridge were 3-0 going in. For West, Nick Milleto – the Army commit – had close to 90 yards rushing, and he had a couple tackles for a loss. The problem for West is now they have to play North Penn. They’re right there in the top three in the conference, and you’ve got to play the other two right off the bat. I’m not a huge proponent of saying it’s a ‘must win’ in week five, but you don’t want to be 0-2 in the conference after only two games. I think the game with North Penn is very tight and could go either way. I think North Penn wins, but it’ll be close. After that, West gets to play some the ‘lesser’ teams in the conference, but the schedule didn’t do them any favors. Having a very good non-league schedule and then having Pennridge and North Penn – that’s nasty.”
SuburbanOneSports.com: North Penn defeated Pennsbury 35-7 and now will take on CB West. Your comments.
Drew Markol: “North Penn plays Pennsbury last week, and they scored 35 points in the first quarter, which on any level is hard to do – just to be able to score that quickly. Rylei Gray, the senior all-everything back, had a pair of touchdown runs. Sal Colello, the linebacker, returned a fumble for a touchdown, and after that, North Penn coach Dick Beck kind of called off the dogs and just took a 35-7 win. Looking ahead to CB West this week, they are thinking ‘let’s not get anybody hurt’ because they’ve got to go to West. Two storied programs – that’s going to be close too. I give North Penn the advantage a little bit in speed, but West is West, and they have a lot of weapons with Miletto, Louie Cipollo and Josh George, their quarterback, and they’ve got good people all over the place. They need this one. It’s a big rivalry, second only behind CB East, and you know they want to get this one. The place will be jumping on Friday night, for sure, between two good teams that are both going to make runs in the district playoffs.”
SuburbanOneSports.com: Central Bucks East earned a big win at Neshaminy. You were there. Your comments.
Drew Markol: “CB East lost its opener to Ridley, and they’ve won three in a row since. They go down to Neshaminy, and Liam Hoey, a senior running back, scores on an 80-yard run right up the middle, which gave East a ton of momentum in the second half. Then he scored again, and Mike Price, who’s healthy again and has been having a tremendous season, had 144 yards rushing and scored two touchdowns himself. He had a 65-yard TD run. Neshaminy tried to keep up with him, but East was able to hold them down in the second half.
“Brock Williams – the senior who was converted from a wide receiver to a running back – had about 120 yards and scored a pair of rushing touchdowns, and for Neshaminy, it was just too much Price and Hoey. It was a good win for East, and now they have Pennridge, so the competition level ticks up a couple of spots. Pennridge comes in after beating West. When you have Mike Price in your backfield – he’s a home run hitter, and he’s hard to bring down. He’s big, he can score from anywhere, and it’s just a question of can Pennridge stop them.
“The Pennridge defense has been superb. They’ve only allowed three touchdowns all season in four games. Blake Landherr seems like every week he’s gotten double-digit tackles, and he’s intercepting passes, he’s recovering fumbles. He’s the next really good linebacker that Pennridge has been producing. Year after, he just makes that whole defense go. That’s another good game, for sure. It will be a lot of Mike Price for East, trying to crack the Pennridge defense, I don’t know if Nate Derstine will be back for Pennridge. I kind of doubt it. With Tetkowski, their quarterback who’s getting better every week, throwing it, Pennridge has a nice mix of being able to run the ball with Trevor Picciotti and throwing it around a bit, and you couple that with a good defense and maybe the best kicker in the conference in Austin Keller – they’ve got a lot of positives.”
SuburbanOneSports.com: The SOL Continental is feeling the effects of Cheltenham not having football this season. Your comments.
Drew Markol: “In the Continental, Plymouth Whitemarsh is off this week. The problem they run into is nobody wants to play them because they’ll probably lose. Most teams are in the middle of their league schedules. PW is probably going to win the Continental and might be a top four seed in districts. That’s going to hurt all the teams that lost their game with Cheltenham.
“Look at poor Quakertown – they won’t have a game week 10 because they were supposed to play Cheltenham, so they’re going to have to go a month-plus before they have to play Pennridge on Thanksgiving. That hurts.”
SuburbanOneSports.com: Upper Moreland has opened the season with a 4-0 record. Your thoughts.
Drew Markol: “They fell behind Penn Wood early on last week, but Upper Moreland comes back. Santino Rodriguez had a rushing touchdown, and he scored a touchdown on defense too and brought them back. Rodriguez got his second touchdown, and Upper Moreland is leading 21-6 late in the third quarter. Upper Moreland goes on to win again. They’re a quiet 4-0, and WC Henderson, who they play this week, is 3-1, but Upper Moreland’s a better team. They’ll have a test next week with Wissahickon.”
SuburbanOneSports.com: Souderton edged Council Rock South 14-13 in a battle of last year’s second and first place teams in the SOL Continental. Your comments.
Drew Markol: “That was an enormous win for Souderton. They were 0-3 and had to win that game. Caleb Moyer scored on a 70-yard run. That’s a pretty incredible story. He was injured in Souderton’s season opener at Spring-Ford, and they weren’t sure he’d be back at all, but he came back. The fact that they had him is just a huge bonus. Brett Pollock, Souderton’s quarterback, also scored, and Souderton led 14-0 at halftime.
“CR South did come back in that game. Jerry Rogers, the running back, had a pair of touchdowns, and they scored in the final three minutes, but Chris Gonce, a senior captain, blocked the extra point that would have tied it, and it allowed Souderton to hold on for the win. That was a game you had to have if you’re Souderton because you know you gotta get to six wins if you can. With six games to go, you’ve got to go 5-1 if you really want to make sure you get in the district playoffs. I think now they can see a path to that. They still have to play Plymouth Whitemarsh, but it’s been a down year for Upper Dublin, a down year for Quakertown, and you can see a path to six wins. Souderton had to have this one, and they block a point to get the win. It’s funny what can happen to save a season. “
SuburbanOneSports.com: Bensalem picked up the first win for Mitch Cohen with a 6-0 overtime win over Council Rock North. Your comments.
Drew Markol: “The strangest game of the week was Bensalem’s 6-0 win over Council Rock North. Vince Bedesem’s back at his alma mater, coaching Council Rock North, and Mitch Cohen – who spent a couple years at Morrisville and last year was the defensive coordinator at Neshaminy – gets his first win.
“It’s strange because Bensalem’s Brennan Farnsworth rushed for 263 yards but only scored one touchdown, which is kind of hard to believe. Farnsworth had 11 runs of 10 yards or more, which is just a remarkable stat. They found the end zone just once, which was all they needed, but that was a good first win for Mitch Cohen, who is one of the good guys in the area, and we’ll see if it propels Bensalem moving forward. It’s hard to get that first win sometimes, but I think Cohen must have been shaking his head. Brennan Farnsworth went up and down the field but did not get in the end zone until overtime, so I guess he got in there enough.”
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