Team

Austintown Fitch

Record	Div.	Conf.
8/3	Div. I	All-American Conference Gold Tier

Fitch vs Massilon Perry

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2010 Fitch 24 - Canton McKinley 21

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Fitch vs Poland

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Fitch vs Poland

Austintown Fitch’s speed on offense has been a major reason for the Falcons’ success

By Tom Williams

williams@vindy.com

AUSTINTOWN

There’s a very good reason why the Austintown Fitch football team is ahead of their Federal League competitors — the Falcons’ key offensive players are hard to catch once they get rolling.

Quarterback Demitrious Davis, wide receiver Chris Davis (Demitrious’ identical twin) and running back Will Mahone — all juniors — are speed demons.

Asked who’s the fastest, Mahone reflected.

“I guess on the game field, probably Demitrious,” said Mahone, the 6-foot, 204 pounder who has scored eight touchdowns for the Falcons (8-1, 5-1 Federal). “Running the 40, I think Chris got him a couple of times, but other than that it’s probably Demitrious.

“I’m not too far behind — a couple tenths of a second in the 40,” said Mahone who also plays outside linebacker and returns kicks. “On the game field, I feel as fast as anyone else.”

Chris agreed.

“I think I’m the fastest at the 40, but like Will said, Demitrious is probably the quickest in football,” said the Falcons’ leading receiver with 19 receptions for 256 yards and a score. He also plays defensive back.

“I think that we’re all fast come game speed,” said Demitrious who has rushed 151 times for 1,067 yards and 19 touchdowns. “I’ve got breakaway speed, I think.

“Every time I break through, it feels real good,” the 5-9, 170-pound quarterback said. “I get goosebumps on my whole body.”

The quarterback also has completed 60 of 97 passes for 970 yards.

The Falcons won their first eight games before suffering a gut-wrenching loss last week at Uniontown Lake, falling 34-28 in double overtime to the Blue Streaks (7-2, 5-2).

Tonight, the Falcons face their rivals from Boardman (6-3, 4-2) with a league championship, playoff positioning and pride at stake.

“We want to win the Federal League and we’re trying to do it,” Mahone said. “We should have done it last week but [we] slipped up. So [we’re] out for blood this week.

“It’s our rival game and it’s [for] the Fed championship so that’s icing on the cake,” Mahone said. “It’s everything that we wanted and we’re going to go out and fulfill our goal.”

Noting this is the final season that Fitch will compete in the Federal League, Chris said, “It’s very special that we can end our Federal League with a [crown] like we started.

“And [it’s important] to end the season with a win so we can have home-field advantage for the playoffs.”

The loss to Lake knocked the Falcons down to the fifth spot in Region 1 computer ratings. The top four teams in each region open the postseason with a home game.

Last week’s 27-20 loss to Canton McKinley (7-2, 5-2) has the Spartans in desperation mode. They are 10th in this week’s computer ratings.

Demitrious called tonight’s game “real important. We get to play our rival team at home to win a title, you can’t ask for much more.”

The Davises are the sons of Chris and Kim Davis. Their sister Cassandra is an Ursuline graduate and a junior at Ohio State.

Asked how often he’s confused for his twin, Demitrious said, “It happens basically every day. I just answer if they call me Chris.”

Asked if their parents ever mix them up, Chris said sometimes.

One of the twins’ best April Fool’s Day pranks happened when they were in elementary school. On that day, they pretended to be each other.

This Halloween weekend, the focus is on getting one more win to perhaps secure a November home game.

“Our goal, the entire offseason when we were lifting, our whole goal was to be Federal League champs and to be 10-0. Obviously, that can’t happen now but we can still go 9-1 and win the Federal League championship and go to the playoffs. We can accomplish most of them.”

Speaking of speed, Mahone and Chris agree that this season has flown by for the Falcons.

“It feels like yesterday that two-a-days were here,” Mahone said.

Chris added, “I think this season feels like it’s been going a lot faster because we’ve been winning. It just feels good to prove people wrong.

“A lot of people thought that we wouldn’t have a good team this year and that we wouldn’t win. So it feels good.”

Mahone said he’s proudest of the wins over Canton McKinley (24-21) and Canton GlenOak (43-21).

“They’re all great wins, but I’d have to say McKinley or GlenOak [meant the most],” Mahone said. “They were big games. They’re always at the top of the Federal League each year and both are pretty good [teams].”

Should Boardman win tonight, the Spartans and Falcons would share the Federal title with Lake and McKinley.

If the Falcons win, it’s theirs outright.

“It’s feels great, we’ve still got a chance,” Mahone said. “We put ourself in a great position from the beginning. Then we slipped up but we’ve got another chance to get our goal.”