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South Range Raiders had high hopes and made them happen
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Crestview’s Trevor Cope (2) is wrapped up by South Range defender Bryce Allen during a regular-season game at South Range Stadium. Both teams have advanced to postseason play. The Raiders will host Cuyahoga Heights on Friday, while the Rebels are prepping for a rematch against Liberty on Saturday.
South Range back in D-VI playoffs
By Ryan Buck
Beaver Township
The South Range Raiders had big plans for their 2013 football season.
Chief among them were the Inter Tri-County League, Tier One title and the program’s first trip to the OHSAA playoffs since 2010.
Before they could embark on a season of dreams, however, they had to erase the nightmares of five seasons of watching rival Crestview walk off with the league crown and a win over the Raiders.
“It all starts with the offseason,” quarterback Ryan Miller. “We worked hard and we came together as a group early.”
The regular season’s defining moment came in Week 4.
The Raiders outlasted league rival Crestview in a 49-35 thriller that hit the front page and was broadcast for all fans in the Mahoning Valley to see.
The Raiders were back.
“It was special coming in 3-0 and facing them in our first league game,” Miller said. “They got us last year and we kind of pinned that one up in the offseason.”
As one of the area’s best running back tandems, Joe Alessi and Billy Goodall have powered the Raiders to the conference title with a 10-0 record, the number two seed in Division VI, Region 19 and a home date with perennial playoff participant Cuyahoga Heights (6-4) on Friday.
Miller, in addition to his own 1,400 yards passing and 16 touchdowns, saw his dominating running game as the foundation for an historic season.
The triumph could have been derailed if not for the depth and solidarity of coach Dan Yeagley’s program.
Before the game, Goodall, who had earned the majority of the carries at running back through the first three games, was ruled out with an illness that had kept him out of practice all week.
Alessi was just fine by himself with 224 yards and five touchdowns.
“Run and don’t mess up,” he told himself when he was told he would carry the load that week. “It was an important game. We knew coming into the season that it was going to be a tough game. The team performed at 100 percent. We came out and we did what we were supposed to do.”
Alessi ended his junior season with 1,385 yards and 22 touchdowns.
Goodall is hardly Wally Pipp, however.
He finished with 843 yards and nine touchdowns as the pair rotated every series and Goodall is just as valuable in cornerback duties.
“I’m happy for him,” he said of Alessi’s season. “As long as we’re winning, I’m happy. I love watching us win. I could care less how that happens.”
The game’s importance was not lost on Yeagley, who has been on the Raiders’ sidelines for 19 seasons.
“It was huge for us,” said Yeagley, who has seen the Rebels grow from an afterthought to the worthy rival. “For a while there we had our stretch where we beat them on a regular basis and they ended up being the 9-1’s and second in the league. Then all of a sudden, times changed and they had their run. It was exciting because you’re beating a whole program. They’re a good team, obviously, and it was good for us to beat them. It was good for the program.”
The Raiders fell to Ursuline in the opening round in 2010. Their seniors were not on the varsity at the time, but saw enough to draw on the experience.
Even so, Yeagley does not plan to do anything different with their time now that it’s the postseason.
“It’s another week of practice,” he said Tuesday. “We’re very business-like. We’re going to do what we do every single week.
“The kids — to them — it’s exciting because we get to play someone we’ve never played before and to be able to have a chance to play at home in front of our fans again.”