Freeport rides Romanchak to blowout victory over Yough
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Friday, August 25, 2017 | 10:27 PM
The WPIAL's first football game of the season was a statement-maker for Freeport junior Austin Romanchak.
Romanchak showed why he's one of the area's top players Friday night, rushing for four touchdowns, passing for another, then adding a 45-yard interception return to lead the Yellowjackets to 43-6 victory over Yough.
The kickoff was one hour earlier than Friday's other Week Zero games, marking the first varsity football game between the two schools.
Romanchak ran for 208 yards, scoring first-half touchdowns on option reads of 63 and 30 yards. After leading 14-6 at the half, Freeport dominated the second half, with 29 unanswered points and a defense that yielded just two first downs.
“They outweighed us up front. They had a huge line,” Yellowjackets coach John Gaillot said. “Our thing was we were going to try to wear them down a little in the second half. We wanted to keep the first half close. The second half, our conditioning made us fresh. We might be small, but we battle and battle and battle.”The Cougars line averages 269 pounds.
Romanchak passed to Isiah Bauman for 21 yards with four minutes gone in the second half, with Bauman catching the ball at the Yough 6 and dragging several Cougars tacklers into the end zone.
Romanchak zig-zagged through the Cougars defense with a 25-yard touchdown during the first minute of the fourth quarter. Five plays later, he intercepted a pass and raced 45 yards for a score.
Roanchak concluded the scoring on a 58-yard run with 5 minutes, 1 second to go in the game, setting in motion the PIAA's running clock rules.
“Among ourselves this year, we have accountability,” Romanchak said. “We let everyone do their jobs. Our goal is to be more conditioned than everyone. Second half, we were trucking, and everyone was still doing their jobs.”
“I lost track of how many touchdowns he had,” Gaillot said. “I'm very pleased with the entire team. For Austin to have a game like that, it was the other 10 players out there.”
Yough was successful in the first half, staging a 12-play drive that ate up 7:28 of the first-quarter clock.
Later, a 14-play, seven-minute drive culminated with an 8-yard scoring run by junior Dustin Shoaf.
“We were able to put together a couple nice drives. We felt real positive about running the ball up the middle and off tackle,” Cougars coach Scott Wood said. “For whatever reason, we just couldn't pass the ball. They were coming off the edge on us, and our linemen were just not able to pick them up.”
After an 18-yard loss on a pitch that put the ball at the Yough 1, Cougars quarterback Jacob Sever took the next snap and kneeled in the end zone.
“When you're in situations like us when you're down 14-6 at halftime, you have to come out and take over the ballgame, and we didn't do that. They did.”
Shoaf ended the night with 32 carries for 137 yards.
“He's a special kid,” Wood said about Shoaf. “He's our go-to guy, but we have to figure out ways to get the ball to other people.”
The Freeport defense sacked Sever four times.
The Yellowjackets are in the unusual situation of getting a week off because Vincentian discontinued football.
Freeport is back in action Sept. 8 with an Allegheny Conference road game against Deer Lakes.
George Guido is a freelance writer.
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