Saturday, October 17, 2009
Fourth-quarter rally falls short for Redmen

By SHANNON DOVE

SPORTS WRITER

GALION — Fostoria mounted a fourth quarter rally, but even the return of senior quarterback Perry Johnson was not enough to move the ball down field with less than two minutes left.

The Redmen fell to host Galion 14-7 in Northern Ohio League football Friday, allowing Galion to remain undefeated with an 8-0 record overall (5-0 NOL). Fostoria drops to 3-5 (2-3 NOL).

“If you had told me we were going to hold Galion to 14 points, I’d say we were going to beat them by at least two touchdowns,” Fostoria head coach Beau Carmon said. “We’ve got to develop some rhythm offensively. We’re trying to get the ball in the hands of guys who make plays. We’ve done a pretty good job of that, but we didn’t get it done tonight.”

Johnson entered the game as the Redmen gained control of the ball on their own 29-yard line on downs, with 1:45 left on the clock and behind 14-7. He fumbled his first snap, but junior running back Trevon Tucker recovered the ball for Fostoria. On second-and-17 Johnson hit Tucker for nine yards, then passed to senior Jordan Bulkowski for 10 yards on third down. FHS took a flag for a false start on the ensuing first down and with first-and-15 at the 37, Johnson hit Tucker again, this time for nine yards before the receiver was pushed out of bounds. The drive came to an end when Galion’s Kyle Kelso intercepted Johnson’s next pass with 1:01 remaining on the clock.

Tiger quarterback Nicholls took knees on the next two downs to preserve the 14-7 victory.

“We weren’t really sure how he was going to react,” Carmon said of Johnson. “Perry’s got a nice arm and it’s tough for him to have that cast on. You could see it on the first play, it was kind of a low snap and he couldn’t handle it with the cast. But the kid’s got a nice arm and with 1:45 left, I didn’t hesitate. I told (assistant coach) Dustin (Smith) ‘We’ve got to put Perry Johnson in, because he can throw the ball down the field’. We’re certainly not going to run the ball down the field with 1:45 left.”

Senior Antoine Williams put the Redmen on the board early in the fourth quarter with a 15 yard run, starting right then cutting back left when he hit traffic. The run capped a three play, 48 second scoring drive for FHS, a drive ignited by Williams’ pass to Bulkowski for 60 yards on first-and-10 from their own 20.

Fostoria held Galion scoreless in the second half after giving up a touchdown in each of the first two quarters.

“We got better,” Carmon said. “We talked about it at halftime, made a few adjustments, calmed the kids down a little bit. We thought that we had Galion schemed pretty well and it turned out that we did. A couple of missed tackled in the first half, a couple of missed assignments by our defensive backs and that happens every now and then. For us though it just happened at the wrong times and they took advantage. That’s what a good team does, they take advantage of mistakes and we made the mistakes, especially in the first half and that was the end of it.”

Starting quarterback Bulkowski fumbled the ball on the second play of Fostoria’s first possession, giving the Tigers good field position at the Redmen 20-yard line. Galion put together a 4-ply scoring drive culminating in a 1-yard rush up the middle by Cartel Brooks to put the Tigers ahead 6-0.

On thethe Redmen’s opening drive of the second quarter, Bulkowski again coughed up the ball, this time as he was being sacked.

“Inconsistency is right, but we are playing hard,” Carmon said. “There’s no doubt about the effort that we’re laying on the football field, but the turnovers and the penalties, that’s been our Achilles’ heel the past two weeks.”

Later in the second quarter the Redmen tried a punt fake on fourth-and-nine at their own 41, but Williams gained just four yards and Fostoria surrendered the ball on downs. It took Brooks just two rushing plays to score, running for five yards on first down then breaking through the right side and zig zagging his way toward the sideline for the 40 yard touchdown. Quarterback Jack Nicholls rushed for two points, giving Galion a 14-0 advantage.