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La Salle Stuns St. Joseph Prep in Four Overtimes

Tagged under: District 12, Gameday Hub, News

| October 6, 2024

Football. Love it or hate it, you can at least admire it. St. Joe’s Prep vs La Salle was without a doubt the most anticipated game of the week. Quite possibly could have been the most anticipated game of the season with how each team was playing. The first half was all defense with neither team scoring, but that changed come halftime.

“Even though I play offense that’s the heart and soul of the team right there. That’s the hardest working room. Our linebacker core, Jack Leuthe, Dylan Clair, Christian Petermen, Chris Fileppo- even though he’s hurt right now- those are my guys. They held it down and played their asses off I’m so proud of them.’- Gavin Sidwar on La Salle’s defensive preformence.

As said, the first half was all defense. The highlight of the first half came on the first drive where La Salle’s Gavin Muller picked off St. Joes Prep’s Charlie Foulke with 7:53 in the first to set La Salle up at the 46-yard line. Punts rained down on the field going back and forth with every now and then a stand on fourth down to force a turnover on downs. Judging from the first half, you would think La Salle and Prep would’ve ended in a 7-3 game. But come half, something flipped on both sides.

The third was interesting for the most part. La Salle opened up the half with the ball and the scoring. After a long sustaining drive lasting almost half of the quarter, Sidwar found Josiah Jackson on a slant route and Jackson punched the ball into the endzone from ten yards away to put La Salle on the board with 6;30 remaining in the third. Prep was forced to punt on their opening drive of the half, but their defense stood tall and forced a La Salle punt right back. Each team’s trading punts felt very first half-ish, but Prep finally found themselves in the endzone on their second drive of the half. Foulke hit Jamir Rowe and let Rowe use his legs to get into the endzone with 1:52 remaining in the third to tie it up at seven. La Salle started driving the ball not to long after getting it all the way to the Prep 33 before the third quarter ended tied at seven.

Now we’ve entered the fourth quarter. La Salle already driving the ball down the field. All they needed to do was go another 33 yards and they would be in the endzone. And that’s what they, Sidwar tossed a screen pass to the running back Joshua Simmons and let Simmons take the ball eleven yards with his legs avoiding a tackle and scoring. La Salle now led 14-7 with 10:55 in the game. Prep started driving right back, taking time on the clock they got into striking range to take a chance and tie up the game. However, an underthrown pass would result in Foulke’s second interception of the game as La Salle’s Justin Hawkins would be sitting right there to pick it off.

 

La Salle took over at their 12 with 6:53 remaining in the game. Luckily for Prep, their defense was on point today and forced La Salle to punt the ball right back over. Prep would start with the ball at the La Salle 40 with 5:45 remaining in the game. Just as Prep’s defense played amazing, so did La Salle’s. Or at least up to this moment. Prep faced a 3rd and 13 with 4:52 remaining in the game, that’s when Foulke found Alijah Turner in the back of the endzone to tie this game up at 14 with 4:41 remaining. A case of great defense but better offense was shown on this throw and catch.

 

La Salle’s next drive of the quarter felt like it had everything in the making to be the final drive of the game. It was the final drive, the final offensive drive of the fourth for La Salle at that. An overthrown pass stuck the ball right into Brandon Lockley’s chest as prep took over at the La Salle 38 with 2:58 remaining in the game. Prep took their time getting the ball all the way to the two-yard line with 8 seconds remaining in the game. This game was in the bag for Prep, but instead of wanting the three, Prep wanted six. A naked role out to the right, Foukle’s pass gets batted up right to La Salle’s Ryan Fandozzi, and La Salle would take over with four seconds remaining in the game. This meant, overtime football.

 

To those that don’t understand the rules. Each team gets the ball at the 10-yard line. You have four tries to get it in the endzone and you are allowed to kick whenever. Whatever team gets the ball second, starts with the ball in the next overtime. This gets repeated until we have a winner.

Prep deferred and La Salle started with the ball. Sidwar found James Dolan in the back of the endzone to get La Salle the first points of overtime. La Salle led 21-14. On Prep’s first play from overtime, a pitch to Rowe let him take it in for his second of the day as we knotted up at 21. Both teams traded field goals as it went Prep, La Salle, La Salle, Prep. We were tied at 27 with Prep getting the ball next. Already with two touchdowns on the day, why not go back to Rowe for his third? Foulke found Rowe in the back for Foulke’s fourth touchdown and Rowe’s third. Having a “quiet” game not scoring, Sidwar found Joey Obrien at the one-yard line as he stretched out to get in the endzone putting La Salle on the board. We’ve traded kicks and kept tying, now La Salle wanted a winner. Going for the two-point conversion, the ball was pitched to O’Brien, and O’Brien on a broken play found Desmond Ortiz in the back of the endzone to secure the La Salle 35-34 win.

“I was laughing, I told Coach Gordon not to run it and he still ran it so I was like, ah let me try to do it”- O’Brien on his game winnning pass

“It was supposed to be a throwback play to me, Coach Gordon, you know he got balls that’s my guy. He asked if I wanted to go for two and I said lets do it lets win the game right here. Joey O’Brien, he won the game for us and Des [Ortiz] and JP [John-Patrick Oates].”- Sidwar on the final play call

“It was a designed Jet sweep throwback, it’s kind of one of those where you need the defense to be in man to man for it to work because nobody has the quaterback. They did not give us much man to man tonight, we decided to role the dice with it and thank god Joey’s [O’brien] the athlete that he is he made the play” said Coach Gordon about the final play. When asked about the play being broken he had this to say, “When i saw him break a tackle I thought he was gonna run into the endzone and then he popped the ball – I don’t even know who caught it, I couldn’t see anything- I’m just glad it ended the way it did. “

 

A stunning win for La Salle, not many people would’ve thought La Salle could hang with Prep much yet beat them.

“It’s all about the locker room, eevryone belived that we would get that win and that’s just what happens when everyone puts their mind to it.” – O’Brien on the stunning win.

“We’ve been working really hard for a long period of time and we have the upmost respect for St Joes but we felt coming in that we had a pretty good team ourselves and we wanted to see where we stacked up in early october so we have to play these guys again in a couple weeks. We know that’s the one that really matters but proud of the way the kids hung in.” – Said Coach Gordan

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