SUNBURY – Having entered the week in seventh place in the District 4 Class 2A standings in which eight teams qualify for the playoffs, Bloomsburg could ill-afford a loss to a 1-6 Shikellamy team, a 4A team that would give the Panthers some extra playoff points in the standings with a win.
Things started well for Bloomsburg as it built a two score lead in the first quarter, but that lead was gone after Shikellamy tied the score with 1:38 left in the third quarter following a disastrous turnover by the Panthers deep in their own territory.
In a tough spot, Bloomsburg responded by putting together perhaps one of its best quarters of the season. The Panthers recovered an onside kick by the Braves to take over with great field position near midfield. Held to just two rushing yards on three carries to that point, Jharee Moore-Stewart busted loose for a 34-yard touchdown run on just his fourth carry of the game with :01 remaining in the third quarter to give Bloomsburg the lead.
And then, after Shikellamy went three-and-out on its ensuing possession, the Panthers proceeded to put together a 16-play drive that took over seven-and-a-half minutes, and ended with a field goal to put them up by two scores with just 2:24 left in the game.
That sequence was largely the difference in an otherwise very competitive, back-and-forth game, and it helped the Panthers even up their record at 4-4 and keep pace in the playoff race with a 39-29 win over Shikellamy.
“Both teams played really hard. They didn’t quit, we didn’t quit, we just ended up making a couple more plays than them in the end and we had a couple of really big stops at the end, too,” said Bloomsburg coach Mike Kogut.
Doing most of his damage late in the game, Moore-Stewart finished with 62 rushing yards on just eight carries but also caught three passes for 53 yards. He scored three touchdowns, two receiving and one rushing. Wyatt Brosious was responsible for four touchdowns, throwing for two and rushing for one, and he threw for 226 yards on 11-of-18 passing.
“We didn’t stop them on that last drive and we didn’t tackle well on that series and that was the bottom line,” said Shikellamy interim coach Mike Hoover. “We told them all week we had to stop 1 and 25 (Brosious and Moore-Stewart) from making big plays and they made too many more big plays than we did and that was the difference in the game.
”I thought early-on, we did a good job bottling him up and stopping him but maybe we just got tired a bit and didn’t have as much fire as we did in the first half toward the end. This team has been through a lot this year, but we will compete, we will play hard and we’ll never quit, and that’ll remain as long as I’m here.”
Bloomsburg took a 15-0 lead less than halfway through the first quarter after scoring on its opening drive and then taking advantage of a blocked punt deep in Shikellamy territory. The Panthers put together a seven-play, 74-yard drive capped by Brosious’ one-yard touchdown run and two-point conversion on their opening drive.
Shikellamy’s ensuing drive went three-and-out and with the ball at the Braves 16-yard line, Jack Katulis blocked the punt and then recovered it at the Braves’ one-yard line. Brosious capitalized with his second one-yard touchdown of the game to make it 15-0 less than halfway through the quarter.
Shikellamy got on the board when Brody Rebuck hit Derek Turber-Ortiz for a 12-yard touchdown reception on the second play of the second quarter that cut the lead to 15-8.
Bloomsburg answered right back on its subsequent drive, putting together a six-play, 77-yard drive capped by a 24-yard touchdown reception by Moore-Stewart at the 8:29 mark of the second quarter.
The Braves countered with a long, 14-play, 74-yard drive that took up most of the remaining time in the second quarter, 7:02 in all, capped with Rebuck’s three-yard run. Shikellamy then recovered a Bloomsburg fumble deep in Panther territory, but the clock ran out on the half before the Braves were able to get a scoring chance.
Receiving the second half kickoff, Shikellamy took advantage and pulled to within a point at 22-21 after Rebuck hit Thomas Pollock in stride in the end zone for a 32-yard touchdown pass. That was one of nine catches on the night for Pollock for 112 yards.
The Panthers answered right back with a seven-play, 68-yard drive capped by Moore-Stewart’s second touchdown grab of the night, this one a 19-yard pass from Brosious to extend the lead to 29-21 at the 5:41 mark of the third quarter.
Shikellamy then evened things as it took advantage of another Bloomsburg turnover as Chase Swartz returned an interception 30 yards to the Panther four-yard line, and two plays later, Rebuck connected with Turber-Ortiz for a touchdown for the second time on the night, and after Rebuck punched in the two-point conversion, it was a tie game, 29-29 with 1:38 left in the third. That was the third touchdown pass of the night for Rebuck, who threw for 153 yards and completed 16-of-25 passes.
But the Panthers answered and retook the lead on Moore-Stewart’s touchdown, and from that point forward, the Panthers ran 19 plays the rest of the game, including three kneel-downs at the end, compared to just eight for the Braves.
The game and potentially season-defining drive went for 72 yards on 16 plays and chewed up 7:32 of clock, and was capped by Justin Pegg’s 22-yard field goal to make it a two-score game.
“They were sitting in cover two and taking away some of our passing stuff so we figured we could run the ball in a two tight-end set and we just trusted our offensive line and trusted Wyatt and Jharee and they did the job and then Justin Pegg gave us that two-score lead,” said Kogut.
“Early on, they stopped the run. They were firing their linebackers and were very aggressive so we thought we could get some things in the air and once they tried to take that away, our kids really responded. We’re a bit more balanced this year than in past few years and that really allowed us to do that at the end.”
Bloomsburg 39, Shikellamy 29
Bloomsburg (4-4) 15 7 14 3 – 39
Shikellamy (1-7) 0 15 14 0 – 29
First quarter
8:40 – (B) Wyatt Brosious 1-yard run (Brosious run), 7-74, 3:20
7:31 – (B) Wyatt Brosious 1-yard run (Pegg kick), 1-1,:04
Second quarter
11:24 – (S) Derek Turber-Ortiz 12-yard pass from Brody Rebuck (Rebuck run), 4-38, 1:40
8:29 – (B) Jharee Moore-Stewart 24-yard pass from Wyatt Brosious (Pegg kick), 6-77, 2:55
1:27 – (S) Brody Rebuck 3-yard run (DePhillips kick), 14-74, 7:02
Third quarter
9:08 – (S) Thomas Pollock 32-yard pass from Brody Rebuck (run failed), 6-68, 2:52
5:41 – (B) Jharee Moore-Stewart 19-yard pass from Wyatt Brosious (Pegg kick), 7-68, 3:27
1:38 – (S) Derek Turber-Ortiz 6-yard pass from Brody Rebuck (Rebuck run), 2-4, :51
:01 – (B) Jharee Moore-Stewart 34-yard run (Pegg kick), 4-53, 1:37
Fourth quarter
2:24 – (B) Justin Pegg 22-yard field goal, 16-72, 7:32
Statistics
B S
First downs 19 13
Rushes-net yards 32-121 25-55
Passing yards. 226 153
Passing 11-18-2-1 16-26-3-0
Fumbles-lost 3-1 1-0
Penalties-yards 7-54 4-22
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
RUSHING: Bloomsburg: Wyatt Brosious (20-68-2), Jharee Moore-Stewart (8-62-1), Team (3-(-3)), Dominick Rosini (1-(-6)); Shikellamy: Brody Rebuck (10-5-1), Mikey Vaders (7-33), Derek Turber-Ortiz (7-16), Luke Keally (1-1)
PASSING: Bloomsburg: Wyatt Brosious (11-18-226-2-1); Shikellamy: Brody Rebuck (16-25-153-3-0), Connor Fasbinder (0-1-0-0-0)
RECEIVING: Bloomsburg: Krue Wheadon (4-59), Jharee Moore-Stewart (3-53-2), Jack Katulis (3-95), Shane Frey (1-19); Shikellamy: Thomas Pollock (9-112-1), Derek Turber-Ortiz (2-18-2), Luke Keally (2-14), Owen Elliott (1-10), Charlie Walter (1-4), Mikey Vaders (1-(-5))
