Norwin wins close season opener over Penn-Trafford 26-14

Tagged under: District 7, Gameday Hub, News

Mia Williams | August 24, 2024

The Penn-Trafford Warriors kicked off first vs the Norwin Knights after a moment of silence for Colin Bargiel, a Norwin Knights student who passed away earlier this summer.

Norwin Football Stadium

A good run by freshman Ashton Comunal with help from junior QB Tristyn Tavares and a first down by senior Jackson Huss put the Knights in field goal range. Evan Pfeifer, a junior kicker, made a 22 yard field goal to put Norwin up 3-0 with 9:22 left in the first quarter.

A good catch from Warrior junior Mason Driskill and a run to the 26th yard line off the kick allowed for senior running back Tasso Whipple to run the ball down the field for 9 yards. However, the Norwin defense was not ready to give up yet, as they had an impactful sack by senior lineman Evan Archer on P-T QB Jonny Lovre. The sack was quickly answered back by a first down by Whipple. P-T then swapped out Louvre for fellow senior QB Derek Carr, a common strategy of tag-team QB work that is usually seen being used by the Warriors. With only 5:17 left in the first quarter an incomplete pass to sophomore wide receiver Nick Ponko and another incomplete pass from Louvre to Whipple forced an unsuccessful 4th down where P-T chose to run without attempting a field goal and allowed Norwin a first down.

Sophomore Nick Ponko

Norwin had three first downs in the following drive, a majority of which were running yards coming from senior Jake Sincak and solid passes by Tavares. A P-T offside call helped the Knights even further down the field but the first quarter ended before they could attempt to put any more scores on the board.

The second quarter started with the Knights on offense. They struggled to string enough solid plays together along with a delay of game call forcing them to give the ball over to the Warriors on their own 10 yard line. 

A first down with Lovre playing QB followed by another first down run by Carr, who was now playing QB, forced Norwin to call a timeout and regroup with 7:43 remaining in the second quarter. With Lovre back in the QB position following the timeout allowed for a long pass down the field to Whipple. Lovre then attempted to hand off to senior wide receiver Jack Weishaar but Norwin’s Josh Lenart was ready and was able to stop Weishaar. The Warriors then went back to their game plan and had Whipple run down the field. He was able to score a touchdown, followed up by the extra point made by Logan Hunter allowing the Warriors to take the lead for the first time in the game, 7-3.

Penn-Trafford huddles during a time-out

The Knights answered back with a quick first down by Sincak and another one by junior wide receiver Cooper Wilson but a sack by P-T’s Landyn Stikkel and an incomplete pass slowed their roll but was quickly followed by a P-T flag. There was then a sack by P-T’s Dom Smith and an incomplete pass but those did not matter, Norwin got themselves in field goal range and Pfeifer was able to make a 28 yard kick to make the score 7-6 Penn-Trafford going into half time

The Warriors came out on offense with two great runs by Whipple with throws from Lovre but they were defended by Norwin senior lineman Michael Strutt. A catch from Weishaar from Carr got a first down and then allowed Tasso to get his second touchdown of the night to make the score 14-6 in P-T’s favor. 

Norwin players run out onto the field

With the game siding in the Warriors favor, the Knights quickly turned it around with an impressive 80-yard touchdown by Jake Knight to make the score 14-13 and put pressure on the Warriors. 

After that it seemed to go downhill for P-T. There was a bad snap followed by one of the players being hurt on the field, and Norwin was able to get the ball back which they made quick work with, rushing a touchdown in by Tavares with 0:33 seconds left Norwin was able to take the lead 19-14.

Penn-Trafford started on offense with two solid passes from Lovre and a run from Whipple allowed Whipple to secure a first down. Unfortunately for the Warriors, it helped them into a positive momentum but they could not keep it going with multiple incomplete passes gave the ball back to Norwin. 

From there the game was all Norwin with multiple good runs by senior running back Jackson Huss and Sincak allowed for the Knights to get a touchdown with 0:33 seconds on the clock along with the made extra point to secure the win 26-14.

“I mean we just shocked the whole world, nobody had confidence in us, our school did not have confidence in us but we just proved them wrong. That is all we need, our team, do not anybody matter besides us” stated Norwin QB Tavares

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