October 15- The Bishop McDevitt Crusaders relied on a dominating defensive effort tonight to overwhelm the Altoona Mountain Lions, 23-0. The game was played at Altoona's Mansion Park, the site of the Crusader's greatest moment of football glory. It was here that McDevitt won the 1995 class AA state championship with a 29-0 whitewashing of Burrell and, after tonight, the Crusader defense still hasn't given up a point on this field. In recording the second shutout of the 2004 season, McDevitt (5-1, 5-1 in the Mid Penn Commonwealth division) held Altoona to 88 total yards; forced 6 punts; made 5 sacks and an interception; allowed only 1 run over 10 yards and only 2 pass completions, and let Altoona (2-5, 2-5) penetrate past the McDevitt 40 yard line only one time all night. It was a total team effort, spearheaded by linebacker Larondo Tucker, who recorded 2 sacks and numerous thundering hits. Fellow linebackers Derek Michtich, Lawrence Edward and Matt Vargo were equally effective, stuffing the run and blitzing harried Altoona quarterback Chris Jubek at will. Defensive ends David Dunn and Brian Weisser provided additional pressure from the corners and joined in the sack-fest. Tackles Jason Kates, R.J. Harden and Mike Berry simply controlled the line of scrimmage, while defensive backs Vince Comasco, Eric McGovern, Gerard Oliver and Greg Williams limited Altoona to 48 harmless passing yards.

Tailback LeSean McCoy led the offensive effort with 137 yards and 2 touchdowns on only 14 carries. Quarterback Jeremy Ricker completed half of his 16 pass attempts for 146 yards and one score, and McCoy, Mike Goldston and Jimmy Owen all had multiple catches. However, the offensive line was inconsistent, often allowing penetration on pass plays, and the Crusaders are still struggling with the center-quarterback exchange, suffering 3 fumbled snaps
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McDevitt took the opening kickoff when John Butler smartly called for a fair catch at the 37 and wasted little time in getting on the scoreboard. After a pass from Ricker to Goldston lost a yard, McCoy rocketed through the astonished Altoona defense for a 64 yard scoring run at the 11:11 mark in the first quarter. Mike Comasco's successful PAT made the score 7-0. When Altoona took possession at its own 16 after the kickoff, Coach Phil Riccio's game strategy became apparent. The Mountain Lions would wait until the last second before snapping the ball, even when the clock was not running. The ploy was successful in limiting McDevitt's time of possession, but did nothing to make the young Altoona team more competitive, especially after they fell behind so early in the game. Nevertheless, Altoona's first 8-play possession, including a fourth down conversion at its own 26, netted only 12 yards and took 4 minutes off the clock. The next possessions by both teams were ended by sacks, with Tucker doing the honors for McDevitt. After starting the second quarter at the Altoona 38, McDevitt suffered a holding penalty, and then Ricker connected on a screen pass to McCoy that was good for 28 yards. When a motion penalty stalled the drive at the 17, Mike Comasco connected on a 35 yard field goal to stretch the lead to 10-0. Altoona's next drive was an 8 play, 18 yard clock-burner, capped by an incomplete pass on a fake punt attempt. Taking over at the Altoona 45, the Crusaders then used an 11 yard McCoy run to move to the 34. On the next play, Ricker deftly avoided pressure by moving to his right and launched a scoring pass to Owen, wide open inside the 10. When Mike Comasco's PAT attempt was wide of the mark, McDevitt's insurmountable lead was 16-0 with 6:27 remaining in the half. Altoona was then held to a 3-and-out and a short punt gave the ball to the Crusaders at midfield, but a fumbled exchange resulted in the Mountain Lions regaining possession at the Altoona 45. McDevitt's defense held again, but a deep punt to the Crusader 16 led McDevitt to run out the clock to end the half.

Altoona had its most successful drive to open the second half. Helped by a rare 24 yard pass completion and a fourth down conversion at the McDevitt 42, the Mountain Lions advanced to the Crusader 39. Dunn and Mike Berry then combined to sack Jubek for a 6 yard loss and forced a punt. The two teams then exchanged punts 3 times while moving into the final stanza. When Altoona running back Chris Koch had his longest run of the game, 17 yards, The Lions had reached midfield. On the next play, however, a tipped screen pass ended up in the hands of Vince Comasco, and the Junior safety returned the interception to the Altoona 30. Three McCoy runs left McDevitt with a 4th -and-2 at the 22. On the next play, McCoy took a Ricker pitch and headed around left end. Aided by a clearing block by tackle Nate Dade, Shady ended the night's scoring with a 22 yard touchdown with 1:22 left in the game. Weisser sacked Jubek to end Altoona's final drive and Ricker took a knee to run out the clock and secure the shutout.

The Crusaders return to McDevitt Field next Saturday, October 23rd to face Central Dauphin in a key Mid Penn Commonwealth contest. Game time is 10:30 AM.

QUOTES
Head Coach Jeff Weachter
We didn't expect them to hold onto the ball like that and I don't know what they were trying to do. Maybe in the first half to try to keep it close, but in the second half we expected them to come out and play football. It was like Tobacco Road, Dean Smith, four corners stall time. We just couldn't get any rhythm offensively, but if they'd rather play that way and be proud of a 23-0 loss, that's their business. The defense played well and we thought they'd play well. Offensively we had breakdowns in the passing game. We didn't want to run Shady a whole lot because he was on the turf and he had to run 31 times last week. We were trying to save him a little bit more for CD. We split him out at receiver but we couldn't get consistent pass protection. And we wanted to run Tuck, but our offensive line forgot what they did last week. It gets very frustrating. We studied the fumbled snaps and thought we had the problem taken care of , then on a third and six inches, we could have kept the drive going and we fumble. Then we have another drive going and we fumble and lose 20 yards. Against Central Dauphin, the penalties and mental mistakes, well, we just have to clean it up offensively. We worked hard on catching the ball after we dropped some. The game plan was to come out and try to get Mike some catches underneath because he's struggled a little bit with the deep ball. He got some confidence and then he caught the deep ball (40 yards). We also poured some holy water on his hands. He didn't drop anything in practice and he didn't drop any tonight so the holy water works again! Tucker has to be one of the top 3 or 4 linebackers in the state. He does such a good job and the defense just played so well. Last week we had the ball control to try to protect our young defensive ends. Tonight we thought we could rest Shady a little bit and throw to get the passing game going because we're going to need that against CD. We knew the defense was going to play pretty well against this team.

Assistant Coach Pat Berry
First of all I'd like to say that I'm really happy with the players because they have executed the game plan, they've done exactly what we've planned the last two weeks. Larondo Tucker is definitely one of the best linebackers I've ever seen and has to be one of the best in the state. He's had two excellent games and I hope he keeps it up for the rest of the year. And I hope the rest of the defense keeps following his lead. We had some things from our scouting report that told us that we could put pressure on them from the outside because they liked to roll out, and it sort of worked well tonight.

WR Jimmy Owen
I'm happy we won. I'm glad I got the first one tonight, but we have to continue to work hard. On the touchdown, they actually rolled into "Cover 2", and that was the first time we saw that all night. I actually had a hitch called, and I converted it to a fade, and Jeremy just threw it up there, a beautiful ball. Special teams is a blast. I'm glad they put me on most of the special teams this year. This is a big week coming up for us. We have to practice hard all week and hopefully come out and get a "W".

LB Matt Vargo
Altoona ran, basically, "Ice" the whole game. They were trying to get their tackles to block down, so we basically had to stay outside and keep our responsibilities. They kind of caught us off guard at first with that running the clock down. We didn't know what they were doing so we just stood our ground, watched the ball and fired off when they snapped it This week we have to practice hard, then play hard and hopefully come out with the win.

LB Lawrence Edward
I think I played real good tonight. It's hard to be noticed when you play with two good linebackers like Tucker and Michtich but I try to do my best. Our coaches did a real good job of preparing us, telling us what they were going to do. It was a pretty easy game tonight. On the sack in the fourth quarter, our coach called a blitz for me, which is very rare. I took advantage of the opportunity and I got him. We're going to be ready to play next week.

DE David Dunn
Everybody has been kidding me about the fumble recovery against Berwick last week, saying that I'm too slow. Hey, Tuck had a good hit and forced the fumble so I picked it up and got as much yardage as I could! Tonight, well, we have great coaches who help us in practice a lot and they did a great job in preparing us tonight. A lot of people thought that we were going to have a letdown tonight, and that we were soft, but we came out and proved them wrong. Against CD, we have to come out strong and hope for the win.

C/DT R.J. Harden
Overall you'd have to say that we did pretty good because we came out with the win. What we have to improve on the line is coming out low on both sides. That's our main problem. As far as the fumbled snaps are concerned, tonight I think it was because the turf was wet from the rain and the moisture was getting on the ball. Now we work on that in practice. We work on it at least 25 or 30 times a day. We started to get it down but, you know, not everybody's perfect. I like playing "D", but that's not really me, but if that's where they want me, that's where I'll be. Next week we have to play hard so we can make them take their Ram and scram!

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