Fort Hill races past Hollidaysburg, 49-10

Sep 24, 2022
by Kyle Bennett

CUMBERLAND, Md. — Staked to an 11-point lead coming out of halftime, all it took was two defensive plays 35 seconds apart to get Fort Hill across the finish line as the top-ranked Sentinels raced past Hollidaysburg, 49-10, on Friday night at Greenway Avenue Stadium.

Despite a first half that saw Fort Hill commit six penalties for 40 yards and turn the ball over three times — two fumbles and an interception — it led 21-10 at the break, with the Golden Tigers getting the ball coming out of the locker room.

After forcing a three-and-out, Fort Hill’s Steven Spencer came up with a blocked punt, recovered by Landon Keech in the end zone for a score at 10:27.

On Hollidaysburg’s ensuing play from scrimmage, linebacker Shane Welsh picked off a pass to set the Sentinels up with a short field at the Golden Tigers’ 14-yard line.

After a 13-yard run by Tavin Willis on first down, Anthony Burns rumbled into the end zone from a yard out for a 35-10 lead at 9:52 following the point-after try by Quinn Cohen, who was a perfect 7 for 7 on PATs.

“We played a lot better in the second half,” Fort Hill head coach Zack Alkire said. “There was a lot of disappointment in the first half. I felt like we were lethargic and in our own heads. We came in and talked at halftime. It was little things; it’s not like it was big, wholesale issues. We’re up 11 at that point, but the expectation we had going into the game was we were going to play better.

“We came out in the second half, Steven Spencer had that blocked kick and really had a spark for us. The next series we had the interception by Shane which was another spurt for us. From there on, the offense was able to get going and finish the job.”

The Sentinels fumbled on their first play from scrimmage to open the game, setting the Golden Tigers up at the Fort Hill 18. Three plays later, quarterback Tucker Rossman found Caden DeLattre at the front of the end zone for a touchdown.

“We had some really good moments and obviously some really bad moments,” Hollidaysburg head coach Homer DeLattre said. “We were top of the mountain for a couple plays, then we’d go down as far as you can go. We had a bad spurt to start the second half. Special teams, turnovers, those kinds of things, that was a difficult time for us to climb back out of it after it got to 42-10. But for the most part, I thought we did a lot of things really well against a really, really good football team with really good team speed. So I was pleased with a number of things we did.”

From there, however, it was pretty much all Fort Hill, as it went on to score 21 unanswered points on a 15-yard run by Tavin Willis, a 44-yard scamper by Tanner Wertz and a 50-yard dash for the icing on the cake by Mikey Allen with 3:43 to go in the first half to put Fort Hill up 21-7.

Hollidaysburg kicker Ben Sosnowski booted a 32-yard field goal to put the halftime score at 21-10.

A 72-yard TD run by Tavin Willis in the fourth set the running clock in motion at 7:57 and made the senior tailback the Sentinels’ leading rusher with 148 yards on nine attempts.

Wertz was the bellcow back with 19 rushes for 146 yards, while Allen had six carries for 111 yards.

“I think all those guys had a really good night carrying the football,” Alkire said. “I feel the ball was spread around a little bit. When guys got the opportunity to make plays, they made them.”

Burns came in at QB during the second half and was 3 of 5 for 70 yards, including a 38-yard catch-and-run by Anthony Palmisano and a 23-yard connection to Bryson Metz.

Fort Hill outgained the Golden Tigers, 481-100, with 41 carries for 410 yards to Hollidaysburg’s 31 rushes for 35.

“Hollidaysburg is always a really good program,” Alkire said. “I think this is an off year for them as far as the number of seniors. Their starting lineup was littered with sophomores and juniors. You can see the talent is there. Homer does a great job coaching those guys up. He came out in with a lot of different sets from what we’d seen previously, even different from previous years when we’ve played them.

“Those guys keep on progressing forward, they’re going to have a great team and be a tough matchup for us in the future. Kudos to those young guys hanging in there and the senior leadership they had.”

Next up for Fort Hill is a trip to Oakdale (4-0) on Friday before heading to Mountain Ridge on Oct. 7.

“Oakdale is going to be a problem,” said Alkire. “I know everyone is really excited about Mountain Ridge because it’s a local game between two area teams. But the focus is on Oakdale, who is a really good football program and a really good football team. We need to be ready, we need to be focused. We can’t make the same mistakes we made in the first half tonight. We’ve got to come in more focused and be a little sharper. I think if we play a sharp game and we’re more focused, I think we’ll have a great game against Oakdale and have a good shot of winning the game.”