November 11- The Bishop McDevitt Crusaders advanced in the District 3/6 Class AAAA playoffs by edging the Altoona Mountain Lions 24-21 this afternoon at Central Dauphin’s Landis Field. The Crusaders, now 8-3, have now earned a rematch against their archrivals, the Harrisburg Cougars, who advanced in the playoffs with a 51-0 whitewashing of Red Lion. It was not an easy task for McDevitt, who avenged an earlier 21-7 loss to Altoona (7-4). Despite controlling the game’s tempo and out gaining the Lions 330 yards to 210 McDevitt didn’t achieve its final advantage until Mike Comasco booted a 25 yard field goal with 4:16 left in the game. The offense was led by sophomore quarterback Kyle Koncar, who passed 35 times for 271 yards, both season highs. Juniors Comasco and Julian Harrell sparkled at the wide receiver position as Head Coach Jeff Weachter went to the pass to advance against Altoona ’s rugged defense. The Crusader defense was as solid as ever, doing a good job of limiting Altoona ’s talented quarterback A.J. Alexander and holding the vaunted Lion rushing attack to 146 yards. Alexander did break a dazzling 60 yard touchdown run in the waning moments of the first half, but was otherwise limited by the smart play of defensive ends Dave Onorato and Matt Dietz.

McDevitt received the opening kickoff and promptly committed the game’s first turnover, as D.J. Patterson intercepted Koncar’s first pass at the ALT 46. The McDevitt defense refused to budge, though, and the Lions were forced to punt. Mike Jones returned the kick 20 yards and the Crusaders started over at the McD 40. On the second play of the 8 play, 60 yard scoring drive, Koncar passed to Steve Westhaffer, and the senior tight end dashed for a 28 yard gain. Then, following an incompletion and a 9 yard pass to Comasco, Koncar followed gritty senior center Hector Cabrera and senior guard Sebastian Sullivan for a 2 yard quarterback sneak and a first down at the ALT 21. Koncar then drew Altoona off sides with a staggered cadence and Onorato fought for 2 tough yards. After a Jones run for no gain, Koncar took the snap and headed around right end. He waited until the Altoona defensive end committed and pitched to Jones, who dashed into the end zone to finish the pretty, 14 yard scoring play. Comasco tacked on the PAT and McDevitt led, 7-0, at the 6:09 mark on the opening quarter. Altoona watched the ensuing kickoff sail into the end zone before managing a first down on the power running of Reggie Mencer. The Crusader defense soon came up with a big play when Evan McGovern recovered an Alexander fumble at the ALT 38, but 2 incompletions ended the McDevitt threat. Alexander then completed a 28 yard pass and it was Altoona ’s turn to threaten as the quarter ended.

On the first play of the second quarter Mencer followed a nice trap block and ran 29 yards for the tying score. After a touchback McDevitt launched the game’s longest drive, a 13 play, 62 yard effort that was kick-started by a 12 yard, Koncar-to-Jones screen pass on third down. The Crusaders mixed the pass and run effectively to advance near midfield before Koncar connect on two big pass play. The first was a 20 yard toss to Matt Vargo, followed by a 23 yard connection to Harrell. Now on the ALT 15, the McDevitt advance ground to a halt and Comasco attempted a 36 yard field goal. The kick glanced off the right upright, however, and the Lions had dodged a bullet. Altoona quickly went 3-and-out and punted again, this time to the McD 41. Again the Crusaders forged into enemy territory, starting with a completion to Comasco for 6 yards. Jones ran for 7 before Harrell gathered in another Koncar toss for a 5 yard gain to the ALT 41. Two plays later Westhaffer made another big gain for 14 yards to the ALT 22, but a big sack and 2 incompletions ended the series at the ALT 40. On the next play the speedy Alexander made a quick cut over left guard and bolted for a 60 yard touchdown run with 1:16 left in the half. Despite dominating time of possession in the first half, McDevitt went to the locker room on the short end of the 14-7 score.         

Coming out quickly in the second half, the Lions were sparked by a good kick return and a couple of Alexander completions to move to the MCD 22. The Lion’s Arin Noonin then missed a 39 yard field goal attempt, but Altoona quickly regained possession when Comasco fumbled fighting for extra yardage and the Lions recovered at the McD 33. What followed was one of the pivotal plays of the game. Alexander passed deep to Patterson near the McDevitt goal line and the Altoona receiver clearly pushed off a McDevitt defender to make the catch for the score. The yellow flags flew, however, and the subsequent penalty and loss-of-down forced an Altoona punt. The turn of events seemed to spark the Crusader sideline and the offense quickly went to work. Koncar passed to Harrell for 6 yards and then Jones fought for 3. Koncar then followed the Cabrera/Sullivan bulldozer for a 2 yard gain and a first down at the McD 35. On the next play Koncar fired a dart to Harrell, who was running a slant pattern. Harrell made the catch and shook free of an Altoona defender at the 50. He easily won the race to the goal line for a touchdown and, following Comasco’s PAT, McDevitt had knotted the score at 14 with 5:36 left in the third quarter. Altoona returned another short kick to the ALT 40 and a pair of Mencer runs soon had the Lions in McDevitt territory. On the next play, though, Alexander was dropped for a 6 yard loss by Vargo, who also forced and then recovered an Alexander fumble. Now at the ALT 49, the Crusaders led off with an 8 yard Jones run, followed by a 1 yard Onorato plunge. Koncar followed a familiar path to sneak 2 yards for the first down at the ALT 40, and then the slick sophomore hit Harrell for a 16 yard gain to move the chains once again. On the next play Koncar optioned to his left, riding a handoff to Onorato around left end. Koncar pulled out of the handoff and was spun around by an Altoona defender. Undaunted, he regained his balance and reversed his field. Soon Koncar was racing around RIGHT end, following a timely Harrell block to finish the 24 yard scoring run. After Comasco’s successful kick McDevitt had regained the lead, 21-14, with 2:18 left in the third quarter. The Mountain Lions botched the following kickoff and started the next possession at the ALT 5. McDevitt’s defense kept Altoona pinned back and forced a punt to the ALT 46. The Crusaders managed one first down before punting to the ALT 12 as the quarter ended.

A dandy pass breakup by linebacker Dante Ushery and a sack by Onorato thwarted Altoona on the next series and Altoona was again punting from its own end zone. The punt traveled to the ALT 42 and Jones returned to the 39. From there it looked like the Crusaders would take advantage of the excellent field position and either kill off a large portion of the remaining time or add an insurance score, or both. Neither happened. After a 1 yard Comasco run and an incompletion, Koncar threw what looked to be a safe swing pass to Jones in the left flat. But Altoona linebacker Alphonso Lewis made the defensive play of the game, darting across the line of scrimmage and intercepting the pass in full stride. McDevitt players, coaches and fans could only watch as Lewis sprinted 59 yards untouched for the tying score with 6:43 left to play in regulation. This year’s McDevitt football team has had plenty of practice getting up off the deck, though, and the Crusaders promptly went about regaining the lead. Jones started things with a 23 yard kick return and then a pass interference penalty against Altoona spotted the ball on the McD 39. Koncar passed 11 yards to Harrell before throwing two incompletions. On the next play Koncar threw an arcing spiral down the left sideline, intended for Comasco. At first it looked like the ball was overthrown but Comasco managed to jump ahead and tip it to himself, finally making the catch at the ALT 12. The Crusaders could only advance 4 yards on the next 3 plays, leading to a 25 yard field goal attempt. Comasco’s kick was a winner, splitting the uprights with 4:16 left to play. His kickoff that followed went out of bounds and Altoona accepted the penalty and forced another kickoff. Patterson took the second kick at the ALT 30 and returned it to the McD 40 as the Altoona crowd howled. McGovern made a huge play by dropping Alexander for a 5 yard loss, however, and 2 incomplete passes followed. Altoona punted back to the Crusaders at the McD 13, with 3:23 left on the clock. McDevitt tried to advance on the ground but the Lions run defense stiffened as Altoona used up 2 time outs. Finally the Crusaders were in a punting situation and booted back to Altoona at the McD 41 and 3:02 left to play. Sticking to running plays, the Lions used 5 plays to advance to the McD 22 as the clock moved under a minute. Facing a 3^rd and 3 from the 22, Altoona burned that last precious time out to make plans. On the next play Mencer took the handoff and surged ahead but Ushery dropped him short of the first down. Facing a fourth down and with no way to stop the clock, Altoona Coach Phil Riccio quickly sent out his field goal team. Noonin arrived in the backfield moments before the ball was snapped, and the kicker’s hurried effort missed badly. The Crusaders took a knee to finish off the game’s remaining 14 seconds, and McDevitt had survived past the opening round.

Next Saturday, November 18^th, McDevitt meets Harrisburg for the second time this year. Harrisburg prevailed, 29-7 in the first game on September 16^th. Game time at Harrisburg ’s Severance Field is 1:00 PM.

QUOTES

Head Coach Jeff Weachter

We challenged our kids this week because we felt they out-physicalled us the last time out there at Altoona and our guys really responded. I would have liked to have run the ball a bit better but we had some things in the passing game work and Kyle and the receivers stepped up and the offensive line did a good job of pass protection. We had to take what they were giving us. They struggle a little bit in pass coverage and their front 7 is so very good. Their defensive tackle, Clouser, is outstanding. I think he should be all-state. They have a 3 year starter at middle linebacker and Alphonso Lewis is pretty good, too. They flow so well to the ball that it’s tough to run against them. Sometimes we do things in the pass game that are just like runs; we’re just flipping it out there to give a guy some space to run. Mike Comasco’s legs are shot. That’s why he was short on that one field goal. But he always brings it. He’s a great cover corner and he made plays for us at receiver. I’m just real proud of all of our kids. Alexander, except for his long run, really didn’t hurt us. I don’t think he wanted to run the ball that much. There at the end, on that third down play it was huge stopping them short and the kicker had to quick run out. If they had made the first down they could have run another play and gotten the kicker closer so I can’t say enough about the defense. They’ve been carrying us all year. I thought the coaching staff on both offense and defense did a real nice job of making adjustments in this game. I think that happened two years ago, when we had Carlisle and CD we tweaked some things after losing to them and designed some different things. We’ll enjoy this one tonight but it will be a long day tomorrow. They’ll be a lot of tweaking for Harrisburg !

Assistant Coach Domenick Rozzi

You know, traveling is difficult to begin with. Going up to Altoona coming off of a tough loss with a couple of guys hurt was a problem for us the first time we played. We’ve brought it around the last couple of weeks, we’ve got more consistency on the front lines and it showed today. Next week? Well, Bring on the Cougars!

Assistant Coach Jesse Shay

Defensively we came in knowing what they were going to do. We just decided to play our defense and run to Alexander, run to the ball and see what happens. The defense responded and played very well. Give Alexander credit: he’s a heck of a player. He was trying to go both ways and he started cramping up a little bit. But our guys were not going to be denied. In the first game we were physically beaten and we were not going to let that happen again. Next week is a big game, the Market Street War. We have to game-plan well and the kids will have to play a phenomenal football game.

Assistant Coach Jake Minnich

The difference between the offensive line today and the first Altoona game is experience. Up there we tried new kids at tackle and today we left Brandon Day in there and Brandon did a great job. These kids practiced together hard all week and getting Vince Sullivan back, you can’t believe how much that helps. When he was injured he was sticking around and following what we were trying to do and he learned quite a bit. He’s a much smarter player now than he was in week 4. Now Harrisburg is a very good football team. Once again, though, with a week of good practice under our belt it will be a ballgame.

 LB Dante Ushery

Altoona is a good team, no doubt about it. We had some good plays and so did they. We just did what we had to do to win. We were playing to keep Alexander in the backfield, to keep him thinking and to pressure him when he passed. He had the one good run today and that was a really good play on his part. Next week, I just want to win.

C Hector Cabrera

This week we had good practices and we just felt better prepared than the first time we played. We worked hard on pass protection and we did have a couple of mistakes, but that’s all right. I’m excited to play Harrisburg again.

OT/DE Matt Dietz

Last time we kind of came out flat and this time the coaches really stressed coming out at game speed and we did. When we had the interception right away we just got angry, and the defense got stingier. We worked on getting a shot on the tackles so the ‘backers could run to the ball; that was the main focus. I think that we cut down on penalties is senior leadership. We have everybody shutting up, taking things a lot more seriously as we go into the playoffs. We’ll be ready next week; we’re excited for the rematch.

QB Kyle Koncar