Springfield Township defeated George School on Saturday. Photos provided courtesy of Thea Bosca/Springfield Twp footall.
SPRINGFIELD TOWNSHIP 37, GEORGE SCHOOL 6
Coach Chris Shelly has a singular concern – getting his team playoff ready.
The Spartans coach is realistic. He knows it might be a long shot for his team – ranked sixth – to make the four-team District One 4A Tournament, but the coach and his players are doing everything they can to make it happen. While a win over George School might not be worth a lot of power points, that didn’t mean the Spartans didn’t take it seriously. They did.
“We don’t look at any opponents as being easy ones – we’re trying to build this thing game by game and get in the playoff mode,” Shelly said. “We’re just trying to get our kids playoff intensity ready.
“We knew George School had low numbers, but they had some impressive looking kids and some good athletes, so we put our guys on their assignments and they executed. We keep challenging our kids – ‘There’s no taking steps back, let’s make sure we take care of business,’ and we did in the first half. The main thing is our kids executing at a high level and hoping we can play some more ball games.”
The Spartans took the suspense out of this one early, scoring three first-quarter touchdowns. Ryan Gibbons scored back-to-back touchdowns – the first from six yards and the second from three yards. Dylan McKenzie hauled in a 63-yard touchdown pass from Ben Cooney to put the Spartans on top 21-0 after one quarter.
“He caught a great throw in stride from Ben,” Shelly said.
In the second quarter, Cooney found McKenzie with a nine-yard touchdown pass, and then Cooney took it in from nine yards out. Jack Hyland wrapped up the scoring with a 30-yard field goal.
Shelly used the second half to give his young players some varsity game action, but he liked a lot of the things he saw from his regulars.
“We have a really good senior class,” the Spartans’ coach said. “Two kids that are really playing their tails off – Will Shapley is a junior linebacker and what we call a quick guard, and he has just kicked butt on both sides of the ball all year long. We kind of forget about him just because he’s so consistently good.
“The same thing with Colby Sabin – these two juniors are really good. They’re playing both ways, and we don’t give them enough due because we’re so focused on our senior class and how great they’ve been. Those two juniors and Ryan Marcino – you see his name running the ball, but he’s been a terrific linebacker.
“Also, junior Jason Morrisey has played guard and defensive tackle for us all year with a soft cast on his hand.”
Friday’s game marked the return to the gridiron of senior Joey Scott, a strong guard who was out for more than a month.
“We thought he was done for the season, but he’s going to have surgery after the season, so he came back to play for us, which was really, really neat,” Shelly said. “It was good to have him back physically and emotionally.”
Springfield Township (6-2, 3-2 SOL) will host Cheltenham on Friday in a must-win game if the Spartans entertain any hope of extending their season.
“It’s really important to our kids as seniors playing their last home game potentially against really talented Cheltenham team,” Shelly said. “We’re all going for it.”
Springfield Township 21-17-0-0 38
George School 0-0-0-6 6
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