WINSLOW TOWNSHIP – “With all the penalties, the sloppy conditions, the turnovers, we just never had a rhythm,” Red Raider head coach Kevin Smith said, “but all that said we had so many opportunities to make a play, we just couldn’t do it.”
Smith was referring to Saturday night’s ugly mess of a game against the Winslow Township Eagles. Winslow scored only one touchdown, but that was enough to give the Eagles a 6-0 victory.
It was a battle full of flags, giveaways, rain and ineffective offense. Early on the teams traded three-and-out drives before the Raiders caught a break on a bad snap. Dino Christensen jumped on the loose ball to set Ocean City up at the Eagle 29.
On third down, quarterback Riley Gunnels dropped a deep touch pass into the arms of Pat Lonergan for a first-and-goal.
Three plays later disaster struck for the Red Raiders when Ejani Shakir broke on a Gunnels pass and picked it off, going 85-plus yards the other way to the Raider 15.
“Those are things we have to fix,” Gunnels said, “and we’re going to work on it this week with St. Joe’s coming up.”
Despite being in the red zone, another bad snap pushed Winslow back and they were unable to take advantage, eventually missing a field goal. The ball bounced off the crossbar.
Another Raider three-and-out was followed by Winslow missing another opportunity – Shakir got behind his defender deep but couldn’t reel in a sure touchdown pass.
After Ocean City punted again, Shakir broke free on a long return inside the Raider 40.
Winslow turned to Jamil Peterson in the run game and he took just two plays to get in the end zone for what would stand as the only score of the game early in the second quarter.
On defense Winslow forced Ocean City to be one-dimensional and deal with pressure.
“They were doing a nice job,” Smith said. “They were playing us in man and putting an extra guy in the box. It made it really hard to run the ball because there’s always an unblocked guy. When a team plays you like that you have to take shots down the field. We couldn’t shake anything loose. We had a lot of different shots and a lot of opportunities. Credit to their guys being able to stick us man-to-man like that. Maybe in better conditions we could have made some of those plays, but we didn’t.”
“We prepared for everything they had,” Gunnels said. “There were a lot of chances we had to put points on the board, we just didn’t do it.”
On the other side, Peterson was effective on the ground throughout, but the Raider defense kept clamping down when it mattered.
“Our defense was great,” Smith said. “If you told me ahead of time we were going to hold that team to 6 points, I would have told you we were winning the football game. But we couldn’t make a play when we needed one on offense.”
Late in the half with Winslow threatening, junior Ricky Wetzel picked off a pass to keep it a one-score deficit.
“Our defense played great tonight,” Gunnels said. “They held them to 6 points, they had a lot of great stops. We just have to finish on offense for them.”
But the Raiders gave it right back on an interception of their own three plays later on a deep ball.
“I definitely thought we should have connected on more of those,” Gunnels said. “We have some really good receivers who are good deep threat guys like Pat Lonergan, Jack Hoag and Jon Moyer. We didn’t hit on as many as we would like to.”
All game long Winslow kept the Raiders in it with penalties to stall their own momentum.
“That played a factor, but we just have to make more plays off those penalties,” Gunnels said.
As the half wound down the Raiders had another chance but couldn’t get on the same page as a shot for the end zone was intercepted with no receiver in the area.
The second half played out much the same as Winslow ran well but couldn’t finish due to timely Raider defense and self-inflicted wounds.
The Raiders just couldn’t get their offense clicking, but their defense played stout even through injuries.
“Our kids are tough,” Smith said. “I think at one point on their last drive we had nine underclassmen out there. Those guys are growing up and they’re getting better every game. But I hope our linebackers are OK – (Nick) Layton and (Roy) Salugta went out. You start to feel like you’re holding it together with duct tape.”
Early in the fourth, Hoag got the Raiders going with an excellent punt return, turning what looked like nothing into a 26-yarder.
After gaining a first down, Gunnels hit Lonergan on another deep ball, this one a huge gain down the right sideline to the Eagle 15.
But the Raiders couldn’t break through and turned it over on downs, their fourth down attempt sailing out of bounds.
Refusing to quit, the Raiders forced one more turnover with Christensen coming up with another fumble with less than five minutes to go.
Again the Raiders turned it over on downs as Winslow’s defense swarmed.
Taking their timeouts, Ocean City got a quick stop to retake possession with 2:23 left.
A sack pushed them backwards and Winslow retook possession at the Raider 11 with a chance to seal it.
But the Raider defense stood tall one more time at the goal line, and Winslow elected not to kick the field goal, giving the Raiders one more chance with 47 seconds left.
After a short pass over the middle on third down, there was confusion over whether it was complete, wasting precious seconds.
The official spotted the ball, the Raiders rushed to the line, and amid the confusion spiked the ball on fourth down as their coaches tried to stop them.
It ended the Raiders’ last-ditch effort and Winslow took a knee to end the strange game.
“I guess everyone heard one thing and the guys on the sideline heard something else,” Gunnels said. “I don’t know.”
“One guy called the pass incomplete and the other guys spotted the ball and wound the clock,” Smith said. “So if it’s incomplete we have fourth down, and we at least can get another call in. But all of a sudden they’re spotting the ball and starting play. So I just think the refs miscommunicated on that.”
Given they were still deep in their own end with little time on the clock, the coach noted, “That’s unfortunate but we don’t have a whole lot of good play calls when you have to go 70 yards in nine seconds.”
The Raiders (2-3) will try to get back to .500 when they host St. Joseph at 6 p.m. Friday, Oct. 7.
“We definitely have a tougher schedule this year than before,” Gunnels said, “but we just have to prepare like we have been and execute when it’s game time.”
“We don’t quit,” Smith said. “Every week we’re up against a team that looks better than us. If you’re picking based on how the teams look in pads, you’re not picking us. And every week these guys come out and play their butts off. So I’m super proud of the effort. We just didn’t capitalize on the opportunities, so that’s something we have to learn from.”
By KYLE McCRANE/Sentinel Sports