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TIFFIN– Since the 1999 season, the St. Paul football program has compiled a sparkling 90-24 record, six Firelands Conference championships, won 16 playoff games and appeared twice in the Division VI state championship game. However, the one thing that has troubled the program over that stretch is winning consistently at National Field at Frost-Kalnow Stadium in Tiffin, where the Flyers 2007 season ended Saturday night in a 26-14 loss to Hopewell-Loudon, the Division VI AP Poll winners. In nine games played at the venue dating back to that 1999 season, St. Paul is just 3-6 overall in the playoffs and regular season combined. Furthermore, the team has played at Tiffin in four straight seasons in the state tournament, but after a 22-0 win over Hicksville in 2004 the Flyers have lost three straight games, including Saturday night, by a combined score of 106-34. The game itself proved to be that of costly turnovers and mistakes, as numerous mistakes haunted the Flyers, mainly the turn of events just before the halftime intermission. Trailing 6-0 entering the second quarter, Flyer quarterback Eric Schwieterman found Joe Graziani for an 8-yard touchdown pass on third-and-goal with 10:01 left in the half and Wes Stein added the PAT for a 7-6 lead. It didn't take the Chieftains long to answer in the form of a 62-yard scoring pass from Tyler Brown to Andrew Brickner for a 12-7 lead with just over eight minutes left in the half. But as the rain continued to pick up heavily, St. Paul had to take over at its 15 with 4:54 left in the half but quickly went to work and moved down the field, mainly behind the pass connection of 26 yards from Schwieterman to Mark Masser. With a fresh set of downs at the HL 30, Graziani cut off a block and appeared to score on a 30-yard run to give the Flyers the lead, but the play was wiped out on a holding penalty. It then looked like perhaps the penalty wouldn't hurt as Schwieterman found Dominic Dellisanti for an 11-yard pass to the HL 15 with just over a minute left in the half. But on the very next play, Schwieterman rolled to his right and looked to have plenty of time, but was intercepted at the HL 6 by Nate Siebenaller with just 46 seconds left in the half, which left the score at 12-7 at the break. That meant history was also against the Flyers, as they are now just 6-10 in tournament games when trailing at the half, but conversely, had they gotten the lead they would have had that of a 13-0 mark all-time when leading at half working on its side. "Too many turnovers and key penalties," St. Paul head coach John Livengood said. "We gave them a short field twice and that interception before the half hurt, especially coming after we had the touchdown called back. And part of the problem too was them getting in the end zone as many times as they did on top of our mistakes." The backbreaker then came early in the third quarter, as a muffed punt that was lost in a scrum to the Chieftains at the St. Paul 10 meant quick work for an explosive offense, and on the very next play Brown threw a pass to the left corner of the end zone that appeared as if both Flyer defender Daniel Tracht and Siebenaller came down with the ball simultaneously, but the official awarded the touchdown to the Chieftains for a 19-7 deficit. St. Paul then looked to quickly answer and get back to within a possession, but the ensuing drive stalled with a turnover on downs at the HL 18 and the Chieftains turned that around and covered 82 yards in 14 plays that was capped on the first play of the fourth quarter on a 3-yard run by Travis Wise to make it 26-7. Another key momentum killer came when the Chieftains badly gaffed a punt, which resulted in an 8-yarder from the nine that gave the ball to the Flyers at the HL 17, but the offense was unable to get a single first down as a Schwieterman pass intended for Dellisanti was incomplete on fourth-and-two. After another HL punt, the Flyers did put together a 10-play, 52-yard drive that culminated in a Matt Wilde touchdown with 2:20 left for the final margin as the Flyers again had the ball in HL territory with under 1:15 left but another turnover on downs ended the game. St. Paul is now 5-2 overall in regional championship losses, with both setbacks coming at the hands of the Chieftains at Tiffin. Hopewell also improved to 2-2 overall against St. Paul in tournament games. Schwieterman, forced to throw a season high 25 times as the Flyers fell behind double-digits, completed 10 passes for 155 yards with Masser catching five for 87 yards and Dellisanti two for 18 yards. The sophomore quarterback also led the ground game with 62 yards on 11 attempts while Graziani added 43 yards on 15 attempts and Wilde 40 yards on 14 attempts. For the Chieftains, running back Adam Brickner, who entered the game with 1,752 yards and 24 touchdowns, was held to just 62 yards on 22 attempts with just one run longer than 10 yards. However, Brown did the damage by completing 15-of-25 passes for 226 yards and three touchdowns with Andrew Brickner catching four passes for 87 yards while Siebenaller caught seven for 77 yards. Despite the loss, the St. Paul senior class became the first group over a four-year stretch to claim state tournament trophies in all four varsity seasons:
2004- Division VI championship runner-up St. Paul (11-2)
0 7 0 7 – 14 Scoring HL- Lukas Schalk 29
pass from Tyler Brown, (kick blocked) 10:43 1st Stats Yards rushing- STP-
141, HL- 62 |
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