Ansonia football passes road test with win at Tri-Village

By Drew Terhall

Dailyadvocate.com

NEW MADISON — It was a crucial WOAC conference match underneath the Thursday night lights on Sept. 19 at Tri-Village High School. With WOAC title hopes on the line, Ansonia remained undefeated in conference play with a 34-28 win over the Patriots.

Ansonia head coach Adam Hall said with some younger and inexperienced guys in the lineup, they were able to fight throw the down moments of the game and play Ansonia football.

“We feel like when we do what we’re supposed to do, we can run on anyone. That’s what we’re built on. We thought that coming into tonight. We had turnovers tonight, that’s the thing that kills us. It killed us all year,” Hall said. “But, the thing that was different tonight was after a turnover we got the ball back twice.”

Both teams had their share of turnovers, but Tri-Village couldn’t capitalize on them to come away with the win. Tri-Village head coach Matt Hopkins said their ball security was lacking in this game, but their inability to score off the turnovers hurt them a bit more.

“We did a lot of things we were not coached to do. You can’t do that against a team that is fundamentally sound. They (Ansonia) had their mistakes as well. But then we would give it right back. You got to take advantage of that and we didn’t,” Hopkins said.

The first two possessions of the game set the tone. Ansonia had the ball at midfield and fumbled it. Tri-Village recovered and then proceeded to fumble the ball back to Ansonia.

Ansonia junior quarterback Layne Bowman got the scoring started as he took the ball 11 yards for the score. Ansonia looked to extend their lead after stopping Tri-Village on fourth down at midfield, but they coughed the ball up again.

But like last time, the Patriots gave the ball back. This time, it was an interception by Ansonia sophomore Cade Shellhaas on a tipped pass from junior Trey Sagester.

Ansonia scored this time around off the turnover as senior Nate Good scored on a 42-yard touchdown run off a toss play.

Tri-Village got on the board in the second quarter as Sagester found sophomore Griffin Richards on fourth down for a 15-yard touchdown pass.

The Tigers responded with another touchdown run by Bowman to go up 18-6 with 3:12 left in the game. The Ansonia running game was a puzzle the Patriots had trouble solving. Everyone from the backs to Bowman always act like they have the ball. Sometimes, defenses are too late figuring out where the ball is.

“We harp on these guys about it. You got to give them credit. Layne carries out his fakes very well. Zane when he doesn’t have the ball, he does a great job of convincing these guys that he does have it. I think not many people knew where the ball was when Layne ran one in. That’s a credit to Zane. Coach Hoening is the guy that hammers that at practice and how important it is to us,” Hall said.

Before the half ended, Sagester threw a 13-yard touchdown pass to sophomore Hayden Hunt to go into halftime down 18-14.

Like in each matchup, it’s always a back and forth second half. Tri-Village came out and scored on the opening possession of the second half on a 30-yard touchdown run by Hunt.

Hopkins said it was great to see the come out and respond like that. But this time, their best shot and effort wasn’t enough to overcome the Tigers.

“Sometimes, your effort is not good enough. Ours wasn’t tonight. Ansonia is a really good football team. They’re physical, physical, physical. They beat us up really good. They deserve all the cheers right now because they played really hard,” Hopkins said. “Our guys did, but we haven’t learned to compete at that level for four quarters yet.”

On a fourth and one in the middle of the third quarter, Bowman struck again for his third touchdown run of the game. This time, he got the edge and went 31 yards for the score.

The Tigers got a stop and score as senior Zane Henderson scored from three yards out to give Ansonia a 34-22 lead.

Down but not out, Tri-Village scored as the third quarter expired. With Sagester doing his best Johnny Manziel impression, he scrambled out of the pocket, stumbled but stayed up and then found Hunt for a 19-yard touchdown pass.

Hopkins said Sagester made some great plays with his legs, especially in the second. He also said they need to get Sagester help, more specifically get the run game going to make life easier on him.

Trailing 34-28 at the start of the fourth quarter and knowing Ansonia would try to drain clock, the Patriots booted the ball straight to the front line. They recovered the kickoff and set up shop at midfield with a chance to take a lead.

The Patriots got down to the redzone and were about to score. However, Ansonia was able to strip the ball away from Sagester at the one-yard line and recovered the ball.

Ansonia drained a lot of clock and got down to the Tri-Village 20-yard line. But, the Tigers once again fumbled the ball and the Patriots recovered with 3:40 left in the game.

After a rough start to the season, the Tigers secondary stepped up and showed off their improvement on the final drive. They were able to contain the Tri-Village passing game and did enough all game long to help give Ansonia the win. Hall said they had two younger players step up in the secondary for them and they had great games.

“We had two guys playing tonight that haven’t really played for us on varsity all year. Sophomore Cade Shellhaas and freshman Carson Tobe. They both stepped up and played great. They played man coverage, played zone, broke on the ball and made tackles,” Hall said.

Tri-Village faced a fourth and three on the final drive. They tried the hard count to get Ansonia to jump, but ended up getting a false start called on them. On the fourth and eighth, Ansonia got the pass deflection they needed to get the ball back with about a minute and a half left. With no timeouts remaining for Tri-Village, the Tigers kneeled out the clock to get the win.

Tri-Village is now 3-2 with a 2-2 WOAC record. Hopkins said it’s tough to see a clear path to getting back into the WOAC title race and now has to get the team to focus on getting themselves into the postseason.

“We’re fighting for our lives for playoffs. There’s no two ways about that. We either got to focus in on that or the season can go south real quick,” Hopkins said.

All eyes are now on Ansonia and Preble Shawnee as both have beaten Tri-Village. They remain the last two undefeated teams in conference play. The Tigers are now 4-1 with a 4-0 WOAC record. Hall said the team is on track to accomplish their goals, but need to keep their focus on the next opponent.

“To be where we want to be at the end of the year, we had to get this one. Now we got that. We had a short week so it will be nice to have the extra day here to get ready. We got Twin Valley South next week. We got to get back to buisness,” Hall said.

Tri-Village will try to bounce back with a road game at Tri-County North next. Ansonia will host Twin Valley South to keep their title hopes alive. Both games are on Sept. 27 at 7 p.m.

Contact Daily Advocate sports editor Drew Terhall at [email protected].