Westminster’ s QB engineered an eight-play drive for the game-winning score in a 6-2 victory.

By Bill Albright | September 14, 2008 at 12:00a.m.

NEW WILMINGTON — It wasn’t exactly pretty, but for the Westminster Titan football team, it was a huge win after a disappointing loss to Heidelberg.

Facing its second disappointing loss in as many weeks, the Titans rallied in the final minutes of the game to pull out a 6-2 win over Allegheny College Saturday at Harold Burry Stadium.

“This is only one win in a long season, but it was a win that our program needed at this time,” Westminster coach Jeff Hand said.

During the scoreless period, the Titans had one touchdown called back and threatened on several other occasions, but didn’t score.

“We have to learn to finish drives,” Hand said. “That is something we have to continue working on. I think as our entire team matures, that [finishing drives] will get better. We have some returners at some of the skilled positions, but we are still young on the offensive line.”

After the two teams battled each other to a scoreless tie during the first 52 minutes of the game, the Gators dented the score column first when a snap from center in punt formation went over the Titans kicker’s head. The ball rolled out of the end zone for a safety and a 2-0 lead with 7:35 to play.

Facing the 2-0 deficit, the Titans took over on their own 21.

Westminster quarterback Kevin Franz engineered the biggest drive of the day as the Titans marched the 79 yards on eight plays for the game-winning score.

On the first play, Franz hit wideout Chad Rosatelli for 33 yards to the Allegheny 46.

For the game, Rosatelli caught a half dozen balls for 58 yards.

“The play opened up real [well] for me,” Rosatelli said. “We ran the play earlier and it wasn’t there. We saw the linebacker was moving up so we had to go further away from him and that is what we did. Franz just threw a perfect ball and put it on the money spot. There was nobody near me.”

After a 5-yard pickup by tailback Nick McKolosky, Franz came up with his second big completion of the drive to tight end Gary Hutsler covering 25 yards to the Gator 16.

“The play is set up for me to kick slide on my steps and see what the linebackers do,” Hutsler said. “I saw [linebackers] bail out and my eyes just lit up. Once I caught the ball, I just kept running as hard as I could.”

Faced with a second-and-4 at the Gator 10, the Titans decided to get the ball in the hands of McKolosky, and the 5-7 junior was not to be denied.

Two McKolosky runs put the ball on the Allegheny 1. From there, McKolosky scooted into the end zone for the game’s only touchdown with 1:43 left.

McKolosky finished with 86 tough yards on 29 carries. He also caught another three balls for 32 yards.

“It was tough sledding out there,” McKolosky said. “I have to give a lot of credit to my guys up front as well as the whole team. We never got down on ourselves and just kept pushing forward. There was never a doubt in our minds that we were going to come back and win the game.”

As for the touchdown drive, Hand felt it was huge for the team.

“That was a drive that was absolutely needed,” Hand said. “The best thing about it is that the guys came through for us.”

The Titans (1-1) will host Saint Vincent on Saturday at Burry Stadium. Kickoff is set for 1:30 p.m.