Gateway really wanted to ring Penn-Trafford’s bell on Friday night.
And when the sound of the cacophony finally rang through Warriors Stadium, it didn’t only mean the Gators had won the Battle for the Bell. It meant they were headed for the playoffs.
Senior quarterback Brad Birch came alive in the second half as he finished 16 of 29 for 196 yards and a touchdown to help Class 5A No. 3 Gateway (4-3, 4-0) oust host No. 4 Penn-Trafford (3-3, 2-1) to a 31-27 victory against their rivals.
“I think that we left a lot of plays on the field in the first half,” Gateway coach Don Holl said. “But we convinced our guys to get some stops and we’re going to make enough plays to win this thing.”
Not only did Gateway win the game. Their victory, combined with Norwin’s loss to Franklin Regional, meant the Gators clinched the Big East Conference title.
“That’s big for us to win the conference,” Birch said. “We faced some adversity this season and we still won.”
Birch missed several games early in the season after he was in a car accident, but he showed he’s all the way back. In addition to his 196 yards through the air, he was instrumental in the offensive attack late, running the quarterback draw to perfection to the tune of 33 much-needed yards in the late going as the Gators were trying to close it out.
“He’s a tremendous athlete,” Holl said. “He did what we needed him to do and helped us to win.”
Though Birch didn’t really get going until the second half, Jaquon Reynolds did his best to keep the team in the game in the early going. Reynolds scored a pair of short touchdowns, including a 1-yard plunge with 7:19 left in the third quarter that gave the Gators a 14-13 lead they never relinquished.
But what may have been the turning point was how the Gateway defense rose to the occasion in the first half to stop Penn-Trafford running back Tasso Whipple.
In the first quarter, Whipple ran roughshod through the Gateway defense as he broke off a 48-yard run that set up his own 16-yard touchdown scamper and peeled off another for 42 that set the Warriors up deep in Gators territory at the end of the first quarter in a drive that stalled at the Gateway 32.
Whipple, who has a school-record 300-yard game to his credit this season, had eight carries for 140 yards and the one touchdown in the first quarter but was held to 17 carries for 39 yards and a late score the rest of the way.
Though he did turn a short pass on a wheel route into a 63-yard second-quarter touchdown, he was held largely in check after the first quarter.
“I mean, a credit to them — they came off the ball and got us on our heels and we didn’t finish some stuff,” Holl said. “That was kind of the game they wanted — to run the ball a lot and stay on the field.”
Whipple’s receiving touchdown with 4:06 remaining in the second quarter gave Penn-Trafford a 13-7 lead at the intermission, but when Reynolds scored his second touchdown of the game in the third quarter and Blake Marsh kicked the extra point, the entire dynamic shifted.
That score by Reynolds started a string of four consecutive possessions in which Gateway scored to turn the tide.
After the Reynolds score, Birch connected with Kenny Lewis for a 34-yard touchdown to extend the Gators lead to 21-13 with 41 seconds remaining in the third quarter. But what may have been the most important tally was a 40-yard field goal from Marsh that made it a two-score game, 24-13, with 4:43 left.
To its credit, Penn-Trafford didn’t quit as things got crazy in the final minutes.
Warriors quarterback Jonny Lovre, who only completed two passes at that point, caught fire as he led a scoring drive that culminated in Whipple’s third touchdown, a 3-yard run with 1:30 remaining to get them back to 24-19.
But though the comeback was thwarted when Tristan Huston high-pointed a great bounce on the onside kick and returned it 50 yards for the clinching score, Lovre hit Nick Panko with 2 seconds remaining and passed for the 2-point conversion to close out the scoring.
With the last two drives, Lovre finished 13 of 26 for 253 yards and a touchdown. But it wasn’t enough as Gateway danced off the field ringing the bell and signaling the start of their reign as Big East Conference champions.
Keith Barnes: kbarnes.pg@gmail.com and Twitter @kbarnes_pghsprt
First Published: October 7, 2023, 3:21 a.m.