Unionville Longhorns pull through in a close one Vs Sun Valley Vanguards
Tagged under: District 1, Gameday Hub, News
Ted Podberesky | September 2, 2023
The Unionville Longhorns hosted their first home game this season against the Sun Valley Vanguards this Friday night. Both teams came into this game 0-1 looking to bounce back from week one and get the ball rolling again. New head coach Tim Murphy wins in a big one tonight beating the Vanguards 26-20 in their home opener.
The Longhorns got first blood in the game scoring within the first 6 minutes with a rushing touchdown coming from Owen Simcox. Unionville then got the ball back again stopping Sun Valley at mid field and forced a punt. Chewing up most of the clock on the ground, quarterback Dom Scattolino connected with receiver Oliver Tar for a 34 yard over the shoulder grab. This set up the Longhorns in Vanguard’s territory where Brody Mclaughlin fought through multiple defenders on his way to the endzone.
With 40 seconds remaining in the 1st quarter Sun Valley’s Noah Griffin had an electric 43 yard kickoff return to set his team up around mid field. From there quarterback RJ Sharrer delivered a strike across the middle to find his receiver Josh Yanonis who broke a tackle and ran in for the Vanguards first points of the game.
Unionville continued their game plan of running the ball and drove down the field, where Brody Mclaughlin punched in his second touchdown from the one yard line with six minutes to go in the 2nd. However, Sun Valley responded quickly with multiple plays through the air, until Sharrer found Jack Penzone out in the flat who made two guys miss and ran in for a fifteen yard touchdown with three minutes remaining in the 2nd quarter. The Longhorns possessed the ball from there and ran down the clock to head into halftime.
Sun Valley wasted no time, getting the ball right away after halftime and scored with a 65 yard touchdown run from Noah Griffin who ran through a giant gap followed by a beautiful kick out block from guard Drake Graham. With both teams missing extra points in the first half the score was now tied 20-20 with a ton of time left to play.
Both defenses showed extreme grit in the 2nd half battling each other’s offenses and shutting one another down multiple times in the 3rd and 4th quarter. Elijah Jones came up big tonight for the Vanguards defense showing why he’s a true run stopping defensive end with three solo tackles and five tackles for loss. Oliver Tar was a superstar for the Longhorn defense making plays in the secondary, breaking up multiple passes and coming downhill in the run game.
Unionville got the better of Sun Valley late in the 4th quarter where they stopped the Vanguards offense on 4th down inside their own thirty yard line. Dom Scattolino commanded his offense down the field with multiple runs until connecting with tight end Nolan Holt over the middle for 21 yards who made a juggling circus catch to put their team in scoring position. The following play Scattolino found Holt again over the middle for a game sealing touchdown.
Although the extra point was blocked, Sun Valley was in their hurry up offense trying to find big plays down the field with time running out, including a catch from Noah Griffin for 22 yards between 3 Longhorn defenders to convert on 4th down. It wasn’t long enough until the Vanguards faced another 4th down where Unionville played perfect coverage and forced a turnover on downs. Scattolino took a knee for the Longhorns and ended the game with a win on their home opener 26-20.
After talking with quarterback Dom Scattolino for the Longhorns who combined for over 130 yards in the air to pair with a touchdown and 65 yards on the ground he stated that “ We gameplanned after halftime to follow our offensive guards more when running the football, linemen lead us to the places we need to be and we did just that ”
Going to the other side quarterback RJ Sharrer who threw for 2 touchdowns and over 100 yards to pair with 42 on the ground says that “ We need to be better as a team and mentally prepare for these close moments so we can close out winnable games “
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