Wow! What an awfully officiated game. I usually say don’t put yourself in a position to lose because of a bad call by the officials, and to their credit, The Skins didn’t. In fact they didn’t let multiple bad calls beat them. Neshaminy managed to get by a surprisingly tough Bensalem team who was aided by the officials throughout the game. Final score Neshaminy 35, Bensalem 22.
Neshaminy scored first, but thanks to poor tackling (again!), Bensalem managed to answer but blew a two point conversion try. Neshaminy 7 – 6. After a shanked Neshaminy punt, Bensalem caught a break when they threw a pass into the flat that sailed over the receiving back’s head. The back, hearing no whistle, scooped the ball up and raced untouched into the endzone from about 50 yards out while the Redskin defense stood and watched. The pass was easily two yards forward and very clearly seen by the fans who were seated perpendicular to the play, including me and should have been ruled incomplete. The refs never blew the whistle stopping play, and the Bensalem back made a heads up play. While this was a horrendous call/non-call by the refs, Neshaminy’s defense gets some of the blame too as players are told (and hopefully, Wilmont and French teach this) to play through the whistle. No whistle, make a tackle! The officials gave Bensalem 7 points on the play, but Neshaminy has to take some of the blame for not playing through the whistle.
Stunned, and still not tackling, Neshaminy found itself down after another score (due to hard running by RB Malcom Carey, who is a load to tackle, and the elusive QB Drasaun Moore, who left the game in the third with an injury) late in the first half 19-7. With about 2 minutes to go, the Neshaminy offense did what the Neshaminy offense does, quickly score a TD to trail at the half 19-14. That score must have raised eyebrows around the SOL.
The second half was almost all Neshaminy, as they scored 3 TDs and only gave up a 32 yard field goal. Mason Jones looked sharp throwing the ball and Mike Garlick and Zach Tredway made some big catches. Wil Dogba really picked it up running the ball in the second half before getting injured midway through the 4th. Bensalem blocked a PATwhen the blocker was about three steps offside and no call, he arrived at the kicker a split second after the holder Tredway got the ball. He was waaay offside.
Early in the 4th quarter Tredway made a nice first down going 15-20 yards with the ball, slipping tackles. Somehow the officials managed to call a push in the back and a personal foul. The calls was made very late as a Neshaminy player was walking quietly to the sideline. He may have chirped at the official originally, but was grabbed by a teammate and sent to the sidelines. The flag was tossed after the player had walked at least ten steps away. I actually thought they were calling a Bensalem player who was pushing the Neshaminy player way after the whistle. Weird. The first down was nullified, and the Skins were penalized about 30 yards. I really don’t know what happened, maybe the calls were legit, but it seemed like Neshaminy was getting a lot of penalties and they are usually very disciplined. It was a full moon though.
Well enough of my bellyaching. I was very impressed with Bensalem’s line and Malcom Carey. He was probably the hardest running RB the Skins have faced this year. He has a huge heart.
The Skins have quite a few injuries, FB/LB Hayden Rooney is playing with a cast on his right hand and wrist. Starting WR, Sophomore Corey Joyce, who is the fourth member of that explosive receiving group and is an excellent receiver who also backs up Tredway at safety has missed several games with a pretty bad concussion. Starting DE Luke Hitchen was knocked out in the first series with a knee injury. Hitchen, a sophomore is the D Line’s best pass rusher and has really come on. Adding to that, backup QB Billy Clark was injured in practice this week and is wearing a sling, as is third string RB Ryan O’Connor, who also backs up at QB and DB. Hopefully the injured players are able to get healthy by the playoffs.
