ERIE — Ever since the season opener up until Friday night, nobody has had an answer for Faith Christian’s top-ranked football team and its overpowering offense. Erie found maybe the only way to stop the Eagles — keep them off the field. But even that wasn’t enough.
Despite being held to just 12 offensive yards, no first downs and 4 minutes, 25 seconds of time of possession in the first half, the Eagles found their offense in the second half, thanks to the play of quarterback Micah Twedell.
Twedell rushed for 96 yards, threw a 70-yard scoring strike and led the unbeaten Eagles to three second-half scores in a 20-16 come-from-behind victory and the 2A Flatirons League championship. Oran Tool scored from 6 yards out with 2:35 remaining, but the drive, and the second half, was all set up by Twedell’s play.
“I consider myself the leader by my actions. I wanted to come out and just really run through the holes my guys gave me and run hard, as hard as I could,” Twedell said. “I don’t know if I put any pressure on myself, but I consider myself the leader by example.”
Faith Christian (10-0, 7-0) didn’t record a first down until 11:23 remained in the third quarter. But once it did, it kept rolling, recording five on an 8:06 drive which resulted in a Derek LePore 1-yard run. His ensuing two-point conversion run tied the score.
Erie retaliated on the next possession as sophomore Kallston Ortega scored his second TD to give the Tigers (8-2, 5-2) a 16-8 lead. But on the first play of the fourth quarter, Twedell hit Evan Marshall for a touchdown to pull Faith back within two points.
The Tigers were driving on their next possession when Ortega fumbled the snap at the Faith 23. The Eagles’ Andy Anderson recovered the ball — one of four turnovers caused by Faith Christian — and set up the team’s game-winning TD drive.
The loss kept fifth-ranked Erie from forcing a three-way tie in the conference standings with Holy Family, but it can’t dwell on that. It has to get ready for next week and the start of the 2A playoffs.
“We knew coming in, just to beat them was not going to change our seeding any. We were trying to win, regardless of points,” Erie head coach Larry Gatrell said. “It’s the way we played I’m looking at right now. No matter what, the new season starts next week. We find out where we’re at Sunday and start the new season and go from there.”
