Before breaking one final team-huddle, Kyle Button and Terry Conway tried to convince the troops not to think about or even speak the word for ... oh, well, say about 360 days.
Unfortunately, for the Mustangs and their faithful fans, they’ll at least have to read it.
Luke Morgan and James Cipriano both eclipsed the 100-yard rushing mark, Richie Harkenrider tossed three touchdown passes and ran for another as the Hornell football Red Raiders rolled to a 59-0 shutout, Friday evening at Ralph Clements Field in Dansville.
“I’m hoping that come Saturday morning this will have been forgotten,”?Conway, Dansville’s first-year head coach, said following Friday’s LCAA?Division I?affair. “We’ve been saying that for a long time now because you can’t do anything about the past. Something that we’ve always said around here is that you don’t ever want to pay for the same real estate twice, there’s no sense in ever looking back. There are always positives and we’ll search for them tomorrow. We won’t mention Hornell again this year.”
On the opposite sideline, Erik Werner was elated. The first-year head coach at Hornell High School would even go on to dub it the most complete win in his first six games at the helm.
“We kind of set that as a goal going into the week and it didn’t matter who we were playing,”?Werner said. “We wanted to have a statement game. We decided we’d play defense first and let that group try to make the opening statement, put ourselves in good field position, and then give ourselves an opportunity to run the ball and be physical. I think the kids responded.
“People will talk and ask, ‘why aren’t you scoring as many points as you had been last year?’, or ‘why are the games closer this year?’ — this team will define itself. It can’t be compared to any other team in any other fashion. Is every game going to be like this one? Obviously not. But we set the tone right from the beginning and showed that we can play at an elite level.”
Zack Bacon caught two touchdown passes, including the second which went for 50 yards. Bacon’s great individual effort which included a hurdled Dansville Mustang defender at the seven, helped HHS build a 27-0 lead just 15 seconds into the second quarter.
Before breaking one final team-huddle, Kyle Button and Terry Conway tried to convince the troops not to think about or even speak the word for ... oh, well, say about 360 days.
Unfortunately, for the Mustangs and their faithful fans, they’ll at least have to read it.
Luke Morgan and James Cipriano both eclipsed the 100-yard rushing mark, Richie Harkenrider tossed three touchdown passes and ran for another as the Hornell football Red Raiders rolled to a 59-0 shutout, Friday evening at Ralph Clements Field in Dansville.
“I’m hoping that come Saturday morning this will have been forgotten,”?Conway, Dansville’s first-year head coach, said following Friday’s LCAA?Division I?affair. “We’ve been saying that for a long time now because you can’t do anything about the past. Something that we’ve always said around here is that you don’t ever want to pay for the same real estate twice, there’s no sense in ever looking back. There are always positives and we’ll search for them tomorrow. We won’t mention Hornell again this year.”
On the opposite sideline, Erik Werner was elated. The first-year head coach at Hornell High School would even go on to dub it the most complete win in his first six games at the helm.
“We kind of set that as a goal going into the week and it didn’t matter who we were playing,”?Werner said. “We wanted to have a statement game. We decided we’d play defense first and let that group try to make the opening statement, put ourselves in good field position, and then give ourselves an opportunity to run the ball and be physical. I think the kids responded.
“People will talk and ask, ‘why aren’t you scoring as many points as you had been last year?’, or ‘why are the games closer this year?’ — this team will define itself. It can’t be compared to any other team in any other fashion. Is every game going to be like this one? Obviously not. But we set the tone right from the beginning and showed that we can play at an elite level.”
Zack Bacon caught two touchdown passes, including the second which went for 50 yards. Bacon’s great individual effort which included a hurdled Dansville Mustang defender at the seven, helped HHS build a 27-0 lead just 15 seconds into the second quarter.
“Last year, he did that for the first time,”?Werner said when asked if the 230-pound fullback has a hurdling career on the horizon. “Now, it’s as though we’ve created a monster. Every time he know’s he’s one-on-one ... let’s be honest you’d be crazy to take him on high, and he loves to hit. He knows people are going to dive at his legs and every now and then he’ll jump over somebody. And they’ve been some pretty amazing leaps. As for track and field, I think he’s going to stick to throwing.”
The option and toss sweep proved to be Dansville’s biggest downfall defensively. In fact, the Mustangs gave up a total of 314 yards to the ground game.
“With the defensive alignment and the blitzing that they’ve become accustomed to, we knew we could hit some big plays on the outside,”?Werner said. “The option and pitches were in our gameplan because we wanted to attack the outside. The line did a good job and we hit the edge hard. Luke ran well and Richie is getting better every week at making the reads on the option. That’s a skill which is learned, it’s not just run down the line and pitch the ball. He’s seeing it better and starting to understand how the option develops correctly.”
“The Bacon kid is outstanding, but the rest of them are just good,” Conway said. “They’re strong, fast, athletic and their overall team speed — we have some pretty fair speed on the perimeter, but we just couldn’t catch up. The option and the edge game killed us tonight.”
In addition to lighting up the scoreboard at frantic pace, the Raiders also clinched a share of the LCAA?D-I championship — a feat they’ve accomplished in each of the last 10 seasons.
“We can cross that off our list as our second goal,”?Werner said. “I expect Livonia to do well against Bath so sole possession of the title will come down to our game against Bath. It’s nice to accomplish that and move on to our ultimate goal. And with Bath being such a big rival our attitude is that the playoffs start this week.”
As for similarities between this year’s version of the Big Red Machine and the last three NYS Class B state championship squads which dealt the Mustangs successive regular-season losses of 63-0, 49-0 and 57-13, Conway glanced over the Red Raider sideline, paused for few seconds and contemplated his assessment.
“They’re good all-around, up and down the roster,”?Conway said. “Even their average players are head-to-toe better than we’ve got, and I?could see that right from the beginning.
“These guys have as good of a chance as any,”?Conway continued on, likely referring to Hornell’s sectional and state playoff aspirations. “I don’t know how good Elba is, and they are still kind of the darkhorse in Class C. It’ll be interesting to see how they fare against Elba, assuming both teams get to that point. We’ll see what happens.”
Dansville, now 1-5 on the season, will now attempt to gear up for its annual “Super Bowl”?— the Backyard Brawl —?a showdown less than 15 miles up the road in Cohocton against the Golden Eagles from Wayland-Cohocton. The Eagles are coming off of a 21-14 Homecoming win over the Batavia Blue Devils.
“Come Monday, we’ll open up with film study of Wayland. But the biggest thing is cutting down the mistakes. That’s huge,”?Conway said. “People don’t see the little things, but we’ve got a ton of things going wrong here. I asked my assistants at halftime, ‘is this coaching?’ I don’t know what we do that’s different from other coaches, but haven’t changed terminology or anything since the preseason. We haven’t put anything in since the preseason and we still have the same old mistakes. If anybody can find the answer, give me a call.”
