Monday, November 26, 2012

FOOTBALL: Studious Spring-Ford keeps making the grade

A collective effort by the Spring-Ford defense, including Robby Varner (56), Travis Daywalt (35), Ian Hare (57), R.J. Sheldon (81) and Mason Romano (52) is one reason the Rams have reached the District 1-AAAA championship.

By Don Seeley
dseeley@pottsmerc.com

Coatesville took Spring-Ford to school last year in the first round of the District 1-Class AAAA playoffs. There was certainly a lot to digest mentally after that forgettable 60-28 loss in front of the homefolk.
And in what has become an unprecedented as well as unforgettable postseason run this fall, the Rams took their own head coach — of all people — to school two weeks ago in a when-will-it-ever-end, 28-26 upset of Ridley.
“I (learned) my play-calling was tight,” Chad Brubaker admitted.
The Rams jumped in front 28-0, then gave up 26 unanswered second-half points to Ridley before it was over and they barely graduated, if you will, into last Saturday afternoon’s semifinal at Pennridge.
“There are times when it’s appropriate to take a shot, like throwing in an obvious running situation or running play-action in a second-and-short situation,” Brubaker explained. “I didn’t do that against Ridley. I needed to trust our players, but I didn’t. That’s on me. They deserved better than that and I realized it after the game.
“Our skill players converted third-down situations over and over against Pennridge. That’s because we trusted them to make good decisions … our offensive line in pass protection and in their blocking schemes, our backs hitting the right holes, our receivers running quality routes, and everyone competing for the ball.”
The end result, of course, was a very impressive 35-24 win over Pennridge.
Not exactly a straight-A performance, mind you, but oh so darn close to it.

(For complete story, click here ... )




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