‘Talbots beat Talbots’; Hampton falls to Armstrong 27-20

Tagged under: District 7, Gameday Hub, News

Greg Hillman | September 5, 2026

ALLISON PARK, PA–

On paper, Armstrong was a heavy underdog—off paper, anything but.

Armstrong played a complete game Friday night, defeating Hampton 27-20 for their third consecutive win over Hampton.

The River Hawks’ running game –as in how fast they ran, literally—was a big contributor to their victory at Fridley. Hampton’s defense had no answer for Quinn Olsen, who outran and flat-out beat the defensive backs on any given route.

“I did what I could,” Olsen said afterward. “Like I said, they were double-teaming me. I made the best out of what I could.”

Olsen made a lot happen. Including getting open and gashing the Talbots’ secondary.

“Some of the plays they had outside back over me and a safety, so they were kind of double-teaming me. Whenever they didn’t have the outside back and safety over me, and they were trying to one-on-one, I’d take the opportunity, and some of [the plays] I made, some of them I didn’t.”

Frank Fabian’s squad is young, and they are in a tough section and class all together. This is a type of win that is going to boost that clubhouse. Especially after what happened last week. Armstrong drove all the way to West Virginia only to blow a 21-point lead to a 2A school. Something Fabian wanted to forget.

“It’s always good to get bad taste out of your mouth, he said. “We were up fourteen points in the fourth quarter [in that game] and let that one slip away. And felt like this one was starting to slip away, but our guys showed a little resolve there at the end.” And our defense came up big on those last two drives”

Big indeed. It almost was Dejia Vu all for the River Hawks, but they held strong and got the job done.

For Hampton… It’s a tough pill to swallow.

The Talbots should fight in every way, but ultimately it was Hampton who beat the Hampton on Friday night.

“I don’t like when Talbots beat Talbots, head coach Steve Sciullo said. “It felt like Talbots beat the Talbots tonight.”

He’s not wrong…

Penalties, miscues, confusion, and did I mention penalties.

At times you could see Sciullo visibly frustrated. In fact, one time he threw his headset, screaming at his offense.

Yeah, it was that bad at times.

The offense, while scoring 20 points, often showed no signs of life. Andrew Reschoff had a few nice throws to convert a couple of third downs, and the run game was of little effect. Decan Csellar impressed, still finding some open gaps and pushing the pile for a few extra yards. Only to have some of those runs get called back by penalties.

Hampton did get some luck eventually, when Reschoff would find Landon Long off of a tipped ball by Jaydon Oliver. Reschoff would find the back of the end zone with 3:24 remaining in the game, but it was too little, too late for the Talbots.

It’s a long season. And it’s only week 1, although it’s game 2.

The penalties and the miscues need to be cleaned up. One could argue that the real test starts next week against Ringgold, who is hoping to be a WPIAL contender in 4A this season. Then it’s Mars and Central Valley. All good teams.

If Hampton wants a shot at the postseason, they can’t keep taking 1 step forward and 2 steps back. That’s not going to get you anywhere in football.

It’s one loss. They know what they need to work on. But truth be told, they were “out-coached tonight,” as Steve Sciullo put it.

Hampton will look to regroup as they head on the road next week to the land of Joe Montana. That’s a tough place to play.

And with a D-1 athlete… uh huh.

I’ll leave you with this Joey Stephenson interview I had with him postgame about the mood in that locker room afterward.