One of the oldest football cliches is "a win is a win," so Riverheads will take this one, but the Gladiators made enough mistakes tonight to last a season, and the bye week that they now get may be just what the doctor ordered. The game was downright ugly at times, which was a shame because the not-so-great play overshadowed a fine 4-TD performance by all-state running back Harrison Schaefer. One media source gave him 275 yards rushing tonight as well as an interception that finally closed the door on Covington's fired-up but badly-outnumbered 20-man roster.
Before going any further, our best thoughts go out to an injured Covington player (did not catch either a name or number) who left by ambulance midway through the second quarter for what was believed to be a back injury. Hopefully someone from the Cougar camp can report on his condition.
One local paper had predicted a 56-0 blowout for this one, but for one particular five-minute stretch of the game, it looked as if the visitors just might leave Greenville with an upset victory. During that surge, which began late in the first quarter and carried over in to the second, the Cougars got a 40 yard QB sweep from their all-over-the-field team leader Tyler Dressler and then followed that up with a pair of long fumble recoveries for touchdowns. Heads were being scratched on both sidelines as an early 7-0 RHS lead became an 18-7 deficit faster than you could munch down a hot dog.
The Gladiators to their credit did not panic and rallied back to take a 20-18 halftime lead and never trailed again, but they could never put away the feisty Cougars and also committed some penalties and mental errors on defense that will most definitely be talked about before their September 16th return to action at Waynesboro.
Schaefer's first TD capped an 88-yard drive and Rinaldo Martina's PAT put the Big Red ahead 7-0 midway through the first. At that time the logical assumption would have been that the Gladiators were about to take charge as expected.
But Covington had other ideas and on the next series, Dressler took off around left end for his touchdown. The PAT failed, leaving RHS ahead 7-6. Then the wheels fell off the bus on not one, but two Riverheads' possessions.
On the first one, the ball was stripped in the middle of the line and bounced perfectly up into the waiting arms of a Cougar defender who already had a head of steam going. He had an easy 50-yard dash right up the gut to put Covington ahead 12-7.
Before the crowd could even recover from that one, the Gladiators committed turnover number two. But in all fairness to Riverheads, this one was not so much a mistake as it was a good hard hit. Schaefer had swept around the right end when he was hit with a jarring tackle that popped the ball a good 10 feet up into the air. This time the ball didn't touch the ground as the Johnny-on-the-spot defender hauled it in and had clear sailing to the end zone from about 40 yards out, sending the delirious Cougar crowd into a frenzy.
Fortunately that would be the end of the RHS turnovers as two more Schaefer scores gave them the halftime lead and his fourth TD of the evening capped off another 88-yard Big Red drive. That TD made the score 27-18 midway through the third quarter and for the first time all evening, it looked as if RHS had some breathing room and might pull away.
But no so fast. Covington roared back, helped along by a couple of blown coverages on pass plays and several major penalties, including a dead ball personal foul that no doubt had Coach Casto fuming. As a result, the Cougars scored again, connected on the two-point conversion this time, and suddenly it was 27-26 with the game very much in doubt again.
The Gladiators finally slammed the door in the fourth quarter, courtesy of short touchdown runs by fullback Cameron "Moose" Lee and Brett Hostetler, the first score of the season for each. Also deserving mention was the first action of the season for junior running back Dalton Jordan, who had been injured in the pre-season. His entry in to the game sparked the Big Red and although he didn't score, he probably rushed for about 40-50 yards on half a dozen tough "I dare you to bring me down" carries.
So the Gladiators move to 2-0 with this victory, but frankly they will need to get back to Riverheads football and cut out some of the monkey business if they hope to go very far this year, considering that there are at least three Shenandoah teams that are making noise early and could challenge RHS for the district title this year. Heck there could even be four or five, with Luray winning at Madison tonight to go 2-0 and with Page County putting a serious 51-0 hurting on Nelson County.
So the Big Red has its work cut out. But Coach Casto didn't fall off a turnip truck (this must be my night for country cliches!) so my hunch is that he has already figured out some choice words for the next few practices that will ensure we don't have quite so many mental lapses in one game as we saw tonight. So Waynesboro watch out.......I suspect you will see a much-better focused group of Gladiators in a couple of weeks.
Before going any further, our best thoughts go out to an injured Covington player (did not catch either a name or number) who left by ambulance midway through the second quarter for what was believed to be a back injury. Hopefully someone from the Cougar camp can report on his condition.
One local paper had predicted a 56-0 blowout for this one, but for one particular five-minute stretch of the game, it looked as if the visitors just might leave Greenville with an upset victory. During that surge, which began late in the first quarter and carried over in to the second, the Cougars got a 40 yard QB sweep from their all-over-the-field team leader Tyler Dressler and then followed that up with a pair of long fumble recoveries for touchdowns. Heads were being scratched on both sidelines as an early 7-0 RHS lead became an 18-7 deficit faster than you could munch down a hot dog.
The Gladiators to their credit did not panic and rallied back to take a 20-18 halftime lead and never trailed again, but they could never put away the feisty Cougars and also committed some penalties and mental errors on defense that will most definitely be talked about before their September 16th return to action at Waynesboro.
Schaefer's first TD capped an 88-yard drive and Rinaldo Martina's PAT put the Big Red ahead 7-0 midway through the first. At that time the logical assumption would have been that the Gladiators were about to take charge as expected.
But Covington had other ideas and on the next series, Dressler took off around left end for his touchdown. The PAT failed, leaving RHS ahead 7-6. Then the wheels fell off the bus on not one, but two Riverheads' possessions.
On the first one, the ball was stripped in the middle of the line and bounced perfectly up into the waiting arms of a Cougar defender who already had a head of steam going. He had an easy 50-yard dash right up the gut to put Covington ahead 12-7.
Before the crowd could even recover from that one, the Gladiators committed turnover number two. But in all fairness to Riverheads, this one was not so much a mistake as it was a good hard hit. Schaefer had swept around the right end when he was hit with a jarring tackle that popped the ball a good 10 feet up into the air. This time the ball didn't touch the ground as the Johnny-on-the-spot defender hauled it in and had clear sailing to the end zone from about 40 yards out, sending the delirious Cougar crowd into a frenzy.
Fortunately that would be the end of the RHS turnovers as two more Schaefer scores gave them the halftime lead and his fourth TD of the evening capped off another 88-yard Big Red drive. That TD made the score 27-18 midway through the third quarter and for the first time all evening, it looked as if RHS had some breathing room and might pull away.
But no so fast. Covington roared back, helped along by a couple of blown coverages on pass plays and several major penalties, including a dead ball personal foul that no doubt had Coach Casto fuming. As a result, the Cougars scored again, connected on the two-point conversion this time, and suddenly it was 27-26 with the game very much in doubt again.
The Gladiators finally slammed the door in the fourth quarter, courtesy of short touchdown runs by fullback Cameron "Moose" Lee and Brett Hostetler, the first score of the season for each. Also deserving mention was the first action of the season for junior running back Dalton Jordan, who had been injured in the pre-season. His entry in to the game sparked the Big Red and although he didn't score, he probably rushed for about 40-50 yards on half a dozen tough "I dare you to bring me down" carries.
So the Gladiators move to 2-0 with this victory, but frankly they will need to get back to Riverheads football and cut out some of the monkey business if they hope to go very far this year, considering that there are at least three Shenandoah teams that are making noise early and could challenge RHS for the district title this year. Heck there could even be four or five, with Luray winning at Madison tonight to go 2-0 and with Page County putting a serious 51-0 hurting on Nelson County.
So the Big Red has its work cut out. But Coach Casto didn't fall off a turnip truck (this must be my night for country cliches!) so my hunch is that he has already figured out some choice words for the next few practices that will ensure we don't have quite so many mental lapses in one game as we saw tonight. So Waynesboro watch out.......I suspect you will see a much-better focused group of Gladiators in a couple of weeks.
