Bellefonte Red Raiders pound Bishop Carroll High School for 63-14 win
EBENSBURG — After lacking that extra gear over the past few weeks, Bellefonte finally found the spark it needed as the Red Raiders routed Bishop Carroll, 63-14, Friday night.
Although the team’s record may not reflect it, the Red Raiders admitted that it has not been their strongest of seasons.
Several slow starts to games and not giving 100 percent every snap has plagued Bellefonte, but after putting up a strong showing against Bishop Carroll, Red Raiders running back C.J. Funk said his team has finally been able to find its rhythm.
“The last couple weeks have been very depressing in terms of performance,” Funk said. “To come out here and absolutely dominate in all four quarters is impressive. Definitely a big momentum switch for us heading into the playoffs.”
Funk played an instrumental part in Friday’s win as he accumulated 96 rushing yards on nine carries and picked up four total touchdowns along the way.
He had two rushing touchdowns, an 18-yard interception return for a touchdown and a 48-yard punt return, which he also took to the house.
With a little pre-game scouting and getting a good feel for how the opposition lines up, Funk said his team was able to take off offensively.
“They tried to line up in the box,” Funk said of the Bishop Carroll defense. “We tried to hit them with a lot of inside runs, and when they tried to put guys in the middle and make it a dogfight, we got to the outside and just tried to see what would happen.”
With 261 rushing yards spread between six rushers, it was a coming out night for the Red Raiders’ rushing attack.
Coming out strong was quarterback Kyle Myers, who shed a tackle and broke loose on a 69-yard touchdown just 17 seconds into the game to give his team an early lead.
“That set the tone right away,” Myers said. “After that, we just kept driving. It really helped motivate us to push hard early on.”
Myers went 7-for-14 with 114 yards in the air while picking up 68 yards on eight carries in the rushing game.
Looking back at a few of the less-than-ideal starts for his team over the past few weeks, Bellefonte coach Shanon Manning said that simplifying the game paid instant dividends.
“Counters have been good to us, and the power has been good,” Manning said of his team’s running game. “We just have stick to what we do and try not to get outside of the framework of what we’re capable of doing. We have to keep it simple, stay within ourselves and try not to do too many things.”
With playoffs on the horizon, Manning said the past week of drills and repetition was critical to finally getting into the right mindset.
“I thought we were focused tonight,” Manning said. “We had a really good week of practice, and its been a while since we’ve looked like ourselves. We did a nice job of keeping our focus, and we came here and executed.”
Although his team was forced with a daunting task in facing an explosive Red Raiders offense, Bishop Carroll coach Sean Billings said it was timely mistakes that put the game away.
“The first play obviously wasn’t ideal, but I thought we answered alright,” Billings said. “Some little mistakes here and there kind of bit us, and it seemed like penalties were starting to hurt us again when we were moving the ball a little bit. It’s those little things that we can control that hurt us, and that’s something we have to continue to work on.”
It was another tough loss for the rebuilding Huskies (2-7), who is wrapping up its first season in the Mountain League.
While many players may be content with just riding out the end of the season, Bishop Carroll quarterback Jake Zazvrskey said his team is working hard to continue to develop the program.
Zazvrskey was one of the few bright spots for his team as he picked up 207 yards on 23 carries.
With the showing the Huskies put up Friday night, he said his team still has much to improve on as the season winds down.
“We just couldn’t get the ball moving,” Zazvrskey said. “And our defense couldn’t really do anything to stop them…We’re hanging with teams better this year and are competing more. We’ve improved a lot, but I think we still have a lot to work on.”
Score by Quarter
Bellefonte- 14 21 14 14- 63
Bishop Carroll- 0 0 7 7 -14
First Quarter
B Myers 69 run (Persiko kick), 11:43
B Capparelle 15 run (Persiko kick), 5:05
Second Quarter
B Funk 3 run (Persiko kick), 8:25
B Badger 51 pass from Myers (Persiko kick),5:11
B Funk 18 interception return (Persiko kick), 1:38
Third Quarter
B Funk 34 run (Persiko kick), 7:52
BC Becquet 7 run (Hogue kick), 2:34
B Bauman 73 pass from Rossman (Persiko kick), 0:35
Fourth Quarter
B Funk 48 punt return (Persiko kick), 10:00
BC Zazvrskey 83 run (Hogue kick), 8:45
B Emel 41 run (Persiko kick), 6:15
Team statistics B BC
First downs 8 11
Total yards 448 321
Rushing yards 261 303
Passing yards 8 187
Kick returns 3-16 10-128
Interceptions ret. 1-18 1-4
Comp-Att-Int 8-15-1 1-6-1
Punts 4-44 0-0
Fumbles-lost 5-2 2-0
Penalties-yards 3-35 5-50
Team statistics
RUSHING- Bellefonte, Funk 9-96, Myers 8-68, Emel 4-43, Lehman 5-34, Capparelle 2-11, Grey 1-9. Bishop Carroll, Zazvrskey 23-207, Becquet 10-88, Hogue 8-15, Dumm 2-3, Farabaugh 3-(minus 10).
PASSING- Bellefonte, Myers 7-14-1-113, Rossman 1-1-0-73. Bishop Carroll, Zazvrskey 1-6-1-8.
RECEIVING- Bellefonte, Bauman 3-103, Badger 2-61, Dann 1-27, Funk 1-5, Catalano 1-3, Capparelle 1-(minus 2).
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