Green Wave Crashes Down on Wolfpack Football

The West Morris Central Wolfpack football team took its first loss of 2011 at the hands of the Delbarton Green Wave in a hard-fought, wet and wild battle at the high school Friday night by a score of 22-21.

The loss for the Wolfpack (2-1) comes after leading for most of the game, and not letting the Green Wave get ahead until a two-point conversion pass from Delbarton’s John Shaffer to receiver Cole Riccardi, which followed a Jamie White touchdown to put the finishing touches on West Morris.

“We had opportunities to win the game. We made some mistakes down the stretch,” said West Morris head coach Kevin Hennelly. “They’re a good team; they made plays when they had to, and we didn’t. Overall, they deserve the win. They made one more play than we did.”

The game started on a positive for the Wolfpack. After West Morris tailback Jon Ciccone returned the game’s opening kickoff 51 yards to give the Wolfpack excellent field position, fullback Stephan Quatorze would take the ball 19 yards to score the game’s first touchdown. Connor Young’s extra point made the score 7-0, and it would stay there for the remainder of the quarter.

The Wolfpack would jump out to a bigger lead after forcing a Delbarton punt in the second quarter. Junior quarterback Jon Gutowski was able to lead the Wolfpack’s offense down the field before connecting on a six-yard touchdown pass to his classmate, tight end Tyler Amandos. Young would connect on the extra point again, but the Green Wave would be quick to respond.

After a Quatorze fumble deep in West Morris territory, Delbarton tailback Jamie White would score from 13 yards out to give the Green Wave its first points of the day. Heading into halftime, the score was 14-7 in favor of West Morris.

Delbarton opened the third quarter with a strong drive against the Wolfpack defense, until a fumble by White wound up in the hands of West Morris linebacker Jason Mackewicz.

The Wolfpack had a hard time getting the offense going to start the second half, however, failing to capitalize on that and another chance, when an errant pass from Shaffer wound up in the hands of the Wolfpack’s Nick Hamilton on Delbarton’s next offensive series.

“West Morris performed unbelievably well,” said Delbarton head coach Brian Bowers. “We had some turnovers in our red zone, but I felt like we could still score at any time. We just had to hold on to the ball.”

Delbarton would put another solid drive together to end the third quarter, following an interception of Gutowski by the Green Wave’s Rob Fajardo. Delbarton would keep the drive going into the final quarter, punching the ball into the end zone on a two-yard run from White to tie the game at 14 with 10:01 left to play.

The Wolfpack, however, would strike right back. Following another quality return from Ciccone, Mackewicz received the hand-off from Gutowski and marched 33 yards for Wolfpack's final touchdown, giving Central momentum and a 21-14 lead with 4:43 left to play.

The momentum would soon swing back into the Green Wave’s favor. A first down stop by West Morris on the ensuing series was negated by a personal foul on the Wolfpack, giving Delbarton a free fifteen yards and an automatic first down. From there, White slashed through the West Morris defense on his way to another score.

That was when Delbarton decided to go for two, putting themselves in the lead for good.

“I just had a hunch that because of all the rain, and it seemed to pick up in the fourth quarter, I just thought to myself, boy, oh boy, that would be a real crusher to lose a game on a muffed snap or that sort of thing,” said Bowers. “So I just said ‘let’s go for it.’ We scored in a clutch situation, we thought we had a good play, and we said ‘what the heck? Let’s run it.’”

Despite each team having its share of turnovers and the heavy rains worsening field conditions as the game wore on, Hennelly refused to blame the loss on the weather.

“It rains on both sidelines, and it rains on both sides of the fifty (yard line). Football is made to be played on the grass in any weather that the good Lord gives us, as long as it’s safe for the kids,” said Hennelly. “We played football in the bad weather, on grass, like it’s supposed to be, and it doesn’t give either team an advantage, in my opinion. Both teams played a hard game, both teams made some big plays. They just made one more play than we did.”

For the Wolfpack, its next task will be to prepare for its first away contest of the season, when it takes on sister school Mendham at 1 p.m.

As for this game, it will go down as a lesson learned for Hennelly’s team.

“You lick your wounds, you look at the film, you see what you did wrong, and you try to correct it. You see that we did some things right, too,” said Hennelly. “(Delbarton is) a good team. We build on what we did well, and we correct what we did wrong.”

Notes: Amandos finished with a team high eight tackles for West Morris, while Mackewicz and senior Shawn Barnes had seven apiece. Quatorze finished with 14 carries for 72 yards and a touchdown, while Gutowski was 4-for-10 passing with 55 yards, a touchdown, and an interception. For Delbarton, White carried the ball 27 times for 149 yards and three scores, with 110 yards and two touchdowns coming in the second half. Dennis Benscko led the Green Wave with ten tackles, while Shaffer was 12-22 passing for 152 yards and an interception.