Petrony's fancy passing powers Poland

ALLIANCE — Just before Dom Petrony’s postgame interview on Thursday night, Poland High football coach Mark Brungard turned to him and said, “Make sure you give credit to your opponent and all that good stuff.”

Two minutes later, assistant coach Paul Hulea broke in and yelled, “Tell him you owe everything to the running backs coach! Give him some love! Give him some love!”

No need to coach him up, guys. After getting thrown into the fire at quarterback late last season, Petrony is now as comfortable in front of a tape recorder as he is on the field.

Facing a defense designed to stop Poland’s running game, Petrony showed off his smooth delivery, completing 8 of 9 passes for 175 yards and three TDs to lead the Bulldogs to an impressive 38-17 opening win at Marlington.

Petrony replaced an injured Jacob Wolfe midway through a Week 7 loss to Hubbard last season, then started the final four games.

“It gave me some experience,” said Petrony, who then broke into a grin and added, “I knew what I was doing, unlike last year.”

“Those games at the end of last season were invaluable for him,” Brungard said. “He didn’t look like a first-year guy.”

Neither did junior receiver Anthony Calcagni, even though he is. Playing his first high school football game — varsity or otherwise — Calcagni caught six passes for 151 yards, burning Marlington for a 70-yard bomb on the game’s second series, then turning a second-quarter swing pass into a 37-yard TD that gave Poland a 21-3 lead.

“He lit it up,” said Brungard, who recruited Calcagni off the baseball team. “He’s a good athlete and I said, ‘You can’t just sit around until baseball season. Let’s come play football.’ Literally.”

Tate Duarte, a 6-foot-5 senior, added a 25-yard TD catch on a fade route for the Bulldogs, who have won three straight against the Dukes, including the last two openers.

“Every year they hit one of those [deep passes] on us, at least,” said Marlington coach Scott Gabelt, who replaced Ed Miley in June. “So we knew it was coming. We just hoped we could cover it a little better.”

With Marlington forced to respect the pass, Poland turned to its running game in the second half and senior Marlon Ramirez rumbled his way to two touchdowns. Ramirez finished with 79 yards on 18 carries and the Bulldogs finished with 157 yards on the ground.

“If they want to fill up the box to stop the run, we can put it up,” Brungard said.

Poland’s defense, meanwhile, did a nice job bottling up the Dukes’ explosive quarterback, Chris Andrews, who finished with 73 yards rushing and 97 passing but did most of his damage after the game was out of reach. Tyler Tokos added 14 carries for 83 yards but Marlington had two turnovers: an interception by Tyler Smith and a fumble recovery by Geno Petrus.

In the postgame huddle, Brungard praised his players, but warned, “This was Chapter One. We’ve got to be ready because Chapter Two is seven days away.”

Poland has made the playoffs for seven straight years. Based on Thursday’s game, it looks like this season’s story is again going to need at least 11 chapters.