High school football: Mount Carmel routs Shamokin in Coal Bucket Trophy game

By Harold Raker
The Daily Item

September 06, 2008 04:00 am

— COAL TOWNSHIP -- Maybe they should have tried the single wing or the wishbone.
The Shamokin Indians tried nearly everything else offensively against Mount Carmel on Friday night in the 58th edition of the Coal Bucket Trophy game, to no avail.
"They had an answer for everything," Shamokin coach Dave Zielinskie said in the locker room after Mount Carmel beat Shamokin for the 13th consecutive season, this time 47-7 in a Heartland Athletic Conference Division II contest.
The Indians (0-2 overall and HAC-II) opened with the single-back spread offense it used in the opening game, but switched at various times to split backs and even a full-house backfield.
"I just didn't have my team ready to play a full game tonight," Zielinskie said.
Meanwhile, just about everything seemed to work for Mount Carmel (2-0, 1-0), which had six different players score touchdowns.
"We wanted to come out and get a lead and we thought if we got a lead, we could control the game, and for the most part, we did that," Mount Carmel coach Mike Brennan said. "There are some good young kids that worked very hard in the program and are going to be real nice football players. You saw some of that in the second half, making tackles, making hits, making big runs."
While the offense gets much of the attention, the Mount Carmel defense played a major role in allowing the Red Tornadoes to retain the Coal Bucket.
Taylor was constantly under pressure by the likes of junior linebacker Sean McCollum, end Colin Menapace and tackle James Goins. A Chris Steck interception after a hit by Kyle Savitski led to Mount Carmel's third TD.
"We were determined to blow them right off the ball. We actually didn't blitz as much as it seemed like we did, but when we did, we made it work," McCollum said. "Everyone was expecting the defense to be the weak side of our team, but the way it's looking we're doing our work out there and making big plays."
Shamokin was still in contention when the second half started, thanks to a 44-yard touchdown pass from Taylor to flanker Tim Bousson with 5:31 left in the second quarter that cut it to 21-7.
Despite a promising start to the second half, the game unraveled for the Indians in the third quarter. After forcing a punt, Shamokin gave the ball back on downs and Mount Carmel began to take advantage of its speed, especially in the special teams. Matt Moroz, who had already scored on a 16-yard pass from Marcus Wasilewski, returned Brent Forbes' punt from the Mount Carmel 46 to the Shamokin 20. That return was a harbinger of things to come for the Indians.
The Mount Carmel threat ended with a missed field goal try, but on the next series, Moroz returned a short punt to the Indians' 18. Wasilewski immediately went for the jugular, hitting wide-open wide receiver Matt Koveleski for a TD to make it 27-7 with 5:44 left in the third. Wasilewski, who praised the defense and special teams for making the offense's job easier, said, "It's awesome to be able to look to the guys next to me, in front of me and behind me and have all the confidence that they're going to do their job and they are behind me all the way."
Of winning his final Coal Bucket game, Wasilewski said, "We've worked for this game and we love to play it."
The Red Tornadoes tacked on two more TDs in the third for a 41-7 advantage. The first followed a Shamokin fumble, recovered by Eddy Stewart. Wasilewski again went to the air to Justin Pellowski at the Shamokin 1-yard line. Dave DeMarco dove in for the score on the next play.
Moroz returned the next punt to the Indians' 20. Freshman Meyrick Lamb picked up 17 yards on a sweep and another frosh, Tyler Karycki, finished it off with a one-yard run. Zielinskie said, "We will regroup. We lost to a very good team tonight."

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