HOUTZDALE — It’s been said countless times that football is a game of inches.
Friday night at CNB Bank Stadium, it may just have been a game of millimeters.
Moshannon Valley defender Alex Reifer stood up Tanner Ammerman a whisker outside the goal line on a 2-point play with 2:18 to play and the Black Knights held on for a 14-12 victory over rival Glendale.
“He is a diminutive linebacker to say the least,” Mo Valley head coach Chris Davidson said. “He is not a big guy, but he’s as tough as nails, and he’s there for a reason. He really came up big.”
By virtue of the Black Knight win, Moshannon Valley was awarded the inaugural Croatian Club Classic Trophy by Black Knight alum Gary Walstrom, who was also a long-time teacher and administrator at Glendale, and will get to keep it at the school for the next year.
“I really think that helped fuel this rivalry,” Davidson said of the trophy. “This is a different kind of rivalry. These kids are friendly with each other. It’s not like it used to be from what I understand. There’s not that venom. But I think when you add in the bragging rights for a year, it made this rivalry a little more rich.”
While the Knights did come away with the win, it was Glendale who controlled the line of scrimmage for much of the game.
The Vikings limited Mo Valley to negative (-22) yards rushing, mostly due to five sacks of Knight quarterback Brady Mihalko totaling 46 yards.
And Glendale was able to run for 111 yards on 36 carries with most of the load falling on Gage Myers, who rumbled for 105 on 14 totes.
“We had two senior starters get dinged up and when you only have 24 kids, injuries really hurt you,” Davidson said. “When we lost a lineman in Andy Honan, the big thing for me is these guys behind him have to realize they are a play away from getting in there.
“We struggled in the run game. Glendale is massive. Their Xs were bigger than our Os. Their smallest interior guy is bigger than our biggest guy. They just leaned on us.”
The teams battled through a scoreless first quarter, each picking up two first downs in two possessions. But penalties thwarted both offenses early and often. The teams combined for 18 infractions for 162 yards.
The Black Knights broke the ice on special teams when Rocco Reifer busted through the line on a Glendale punt, blocked it, scooped up the ball and ran it back 26 yards to score the game’s opening TD 26 seconds into the second quarter.
“It’s not that people don’t realize that Rocco is an exceptional athlete,” Davidson said. “Everybody knows that. But early in the year, he was being primarily used on offense. But he’s such an important team guy and he came over to the defensive side and really solidified some things for us.
“And on special teams .. we put a lot of emphasis on special teams. We felt like we could get a punt. We talked about it all week. (Assistant coach) Tom Janocko was preaching it all week. Special teams have been very good to us, and today it was the difference in the ball game.”
”That was a big momentum shift their way,” Glendale head coach Chase Hill said of the blocked punt. “It’s tough to bounce back from something like that. If you take that away, it’s 7-6 at the half. We did a good job bouncing back from the adversity when it faced us. We didn’t hang our heads. I was proud of them for that.”{/div}
Glendale certainly bounced back in a big way, responding with the first sustained drive by either team, traveling 64 yards in 11 plays, overcoming a holding penalty in the series with a 15-yard Logan Skebeck to Rylan Hoopsick-Bell pass one play before Levi Hamilton scored from two yards out to make it 7-6.
The 2-point conversion failed, keeping the Knights in front 7-6 with 5:11 left in the first half.
Mo Valley begin its next drive on its own 42 after a short kickoff and was able to navigate the 58 yards to the end zone in just six plays, mostly through the air.
Mihalko found Chase Mital for a 4-yard gain to convert a third down, then hit Jack Moore for 26 on the next play.
Two plays later, Mihalko connected with Moore again, this time on a fade in the corner of the end zone for a 20-yard TD pass with 2:33 left in the half. J.C. Smith’s second PAT made it 14-6.
The Knights quickly forced a three-and-out and got the ball back, but three straight Mihalko incompletions followed by a 24-yard punt gave the Vikings the ball at the 40 with time winding down in the half.
On third-and-14 from the Viking 36, Skebeck fooled the Knight defense with a wrap around draw play to Myers, who sliced through the defense for a 53-yard gain to the Mo Valley 11.
But on the next play, Skebeck fumbled and Smith pounced on the ball at the 16 to stymie the Viking drive just before the half.
Neither team could gain much traction in the third, but another special teams play for Mo Valley helped keep the hosts in control.
Smith booted a 33-yard punt that rolled inside the Viking 5 where Gavin Lovell downed it at the 1-yard line.
Glendale was able to pick up a first down when it drew Mo Valley offsides from punt formation on fourth-and-1, but the Vikings could go no further and punted from their own 9 a few plays later.
The Knights once again went three-and-out and were then whistled for a 15-yard penalty to push them back to the 37 where they punted back to the Vikings.
Glendale and Mo Valley traded punts over the next two possession with the Vikings coming out of the exchange with good field position at the 40.
The Vikings went into its hurry-up offense and marched down the field with a mix of the run and pass.
Skebeck completed 4-of-5 passes for 21 yards, converting a third down and a fourth down with his arm.
Myers added six runs for 28 yards and Skebeck bulled over the goal line from a yard out with 2:18 left to play.
“Our two-minute offense looked great,” Hill said. “Logan was making really good reads. Gage was running hard. Our line was firing out. They wanted to move the guys in front of them. Our receivers were sitting in spaces. Everything was clicking for us.”
But that’s when Alex Reifer made the defensive play of the game to keep the Vikings from tying things up.
Mo Valley tried to run out the clock, but lost six yards on two running plays then tried to convert a long third down with a pass. Mihalko hit Moore for a 13-yard gain, but the Knights had to punt on fourth-and-3, giving Glendale the ball back at its own 28 with 64 seconds to play.
The Vikings only gained two yards on their first three plays, then looked to have a first down on a fourth-and-8 pass play. But the ball was fumbled after the reception and Brennan Canner recovered at the Glendale 39.
“Our defense won this game for us. Our defense and our special teams,” Davidson said. “Because I sure made enough bonehead mistakes on offense to go around for everybody.”
Mo Valley needed one snap to end the game with the 14-12 victory, despite getting doubled up in yardage and making just eight first downs in the contest.
Glendale ran for 111 yards and Skebeck threw for 115 to give the Vikings 226 total yards.
Mihalko threw for 135 for the Knights, who ended up with just 113 total yards due to the negative rushing totals.
Mason Abernethy caught four passes for 73 yards, while Moore hauled in four for 62.
Ammerman led the Vikings with six catches for 44 yards, while Hamilton caught four for 28.
Mo Valley evened its record at 2-2. Glendale slipped to 0-4.
The Knights visit Mount Union in Week 5. The Vikings host Southern Huntingdon.