Westminster’s strong finish foils Grove City

By Bill Albright

The Titans rallied to take the lead, then held off the Wolverines for a 24-21 win.

NEW WILMINGTON — Although Westminster led for much of the game, the Titans were unable to decide the issue until the final three minutes.

Westminster twice led by as many as 10 points but saw those leads evaporate into a 21-17 deficit to Grove City midway through the final period.

That is when the Titans decided to take matters in their own hands on both sides of the ball, as they came from behind in the final seconds to defeat the Wolverines, 24-21, at Harold Burry Stadium.

“It was a great, hard-fought game,” said Westminster (5-4, 3-3) coach Jeff Hand. “When you have two fairly evenly-matched teams going against each other, it was fitting to have it come down to the last play. I guess that is the way it is supposed to be.”

Taking over on their own 26 with less than three minutes left and trailing by four, the Titans launched what turned out to be the winning drive engineered by junior quarterback Kevin Franz.

“When the defense got the ball back for us, that is when we [the offense] said: Hey, this is what we play football for,” said Franz. “Facing 70 yards in the last three minutes, that is what you practice hard for, looking for a way to win the game.”

Mixing the pass with the run, the Titans were faced with a third-and-2 at the Grove City 8.

That is when Franz found Justin Morgano open in the left corner of the end zone for an 8-yard scoring pass with 46 seconds left. Trevor Young’s PAT made it 24-21 Titans.

“We saw them [Grove City] run a lot of man coverage,” explained Franz. “We decided that the next time we get inside the 10 or 15, we were going to run a corner where the outside guy runs a skinny post and the inside guy runs toward the corner of the end zone. That is what we called and he [Morgano] was there to make the catch.”

But he Wolverines (5-4, 2-3) didn’t go quietly.

Led by quarterback Andrew DiDonato, Grove City drove down until they faced a second-and-goal inside the Titan 1-yard line with three seconds left on the clock.

After calling a timeout, GCC coach Chris Smith elected to go for the win instead of the tying field goal, but the Wolverines were denied the victory as DiDonato was stacked up short of the goal line by the Westminster defense.

“There was no question in my mind that we weren’t going to try to kick that field goal,” said GCC coach Chris Smith. “We had the ball a half-yard away from the goal line and we had the choice of running the power or trying the sneak. We tried the sneak, but we just didn’t get in.”

Although the Titans had the edge on the scoreboard, the Wolverines had the edge in most of the statistical categories. GCC held a 31-17 edge in first downs, and led in yards rushing (218-125), total offense (233-136) and time of possession (34:34-25:26).

Just like last year, Grove City was able to move the ball with consistency between the 20-yard lines, but the red zone was not kind to the Wolverines. Moving inside the red zone three times on their first four possessions, the Wolverines were turned away on a pair of stops and a lost fumble.

“It was frustrating to have that happen, especially with the great effort we had today,” said Smith. “To be able to come back and be in a position to win the game, you hate to have things like that not reward the players for their efforts.”