Team

Austintown Fitch

Record	Div.	Conf.
6/4	Div. I	All-American Conference Gold Tier

By MARTY GITLIN

sports@vindy.com

EUCLID

Sometimes statistics don’t lie. They certainly told the whole story Saturday night in a Division I regional quarterfinal at Sparky DiBiasio Stadium.

The numbers explained the 28-7 defeat of Austintown Fitch by host Euclid. Two of them screamed the loudest. The Falcons finished with two yards passing and managed one first down in the first three quarters.

The Panthers were simply too big, too strong, too fast and two experienced for Fitch. And it showed from beginning to end.

It was Euclid’s first playoff win in 22 years years.

Not that the Falcons didn’t hang around for a while. They forced two punts to keep it scoreless until Euclid senior quarterback Craig Robinson hit wide-open senior wide receiver David Wright, who had beaten two defenders, for a touchdown with two minutes remaining in the first quarter to give their team a 7-0 lead.

Fitch answered with its lone offensive highlight of the game when sophomore Jakari Lumsden gathered in the ensuing kickoff, bolted right and sprinted down the sideline 90 yards for the tying score.

Euclid spent the rest of the game displaying its superiority in every facet. It controlled the line of scrimmage and continued to provide terrible field position for its guest.

The lone first down for the Falcons before intermission was achieved on an eight-yard run by sophomore back Randy Smith late in the first quarter.

“Our offense has struggled all year,” lamented veteran Fitch coach Phil Annarella. “We have four or five sophomores starting on that side of the ball, so it doesn’t take a genius to figure it out. Plus Euclid is a very good football team that played a great game. They’re so much bigger than us size-wise and they out-executed us.”

The Panthers, however, didn’t take control of the scoreboard for a while. Their defense continued to force punts and backfield mates Chris Collins and Javon Avery racked up yards, but their team did not forge ahead to stay until the lone turnover of the game provided an opportunity.

With two minutes left in the first half, Falcons quarterback Nate Fowler popped up a pass in an attempt to throw it out of bounds. Euclid defensive back Anthony Johnson intercepted it, then a personal foul by Fitch on the return placed the ball four yards from paydirt. Robinson eventually scored on fourth-and-goal from the 1 to make it 14-7 at halftime, at which point Smith had 47 of the Falcons’ 53 total yards of offense.

It would only get worse. Four plays into the third quarter, Wright outfought a Fitch defender, bobbled a long pass from Robinson, and then grabbed it for a 44-yard score to stretch the lead to 21-7.

Euclid punter Geino Webb pinned the Falcons back on their 1- and 9-yard lines to start their next two possessions. For a team that struggled to achieve even an occasional first down all night, it was a recipe for disaster. And when Avery bolted 30 yards to set up a 12-yard touchdown pass from Robinson to Chris Boone, the game had its final score.

“The defense has played great all year, but it doesn’t help when your offense is not moving the ball,” Annarella said. “We’ve been playing with a JV offense all season with all those young kids.”

The last 10 minutes were marred by a neck injury sustained by Falcons senior linebacker Damien Gray. The game was held up for nearly a half hour as an ambulance was summoned to take him to the hospital.