1990

Division II State Semi Finalist

2nd in Division II Region 5

4th ranked AP Poll

 

 

BR	1990 Saccoccia	OPP
42	Youngstown East	14
35	@ Weirton Wva.	6
37	Parma Padua	0
24	Youngstown Rayen	0
55	Cleveland West Tech	34
13	Cleveland Benedictine	12
24	Youngstown Boardman	28
23	Alliance	0
23	@ Massillon Perry	7
24	Steubenville Catholic Central	0
26	Buckeye Local	7
10	N Uniontown Lake	7
0	N Columbus St. Francis DeSales	13
336	11-2-0	128

Regional Semifinal, Friday November 2nd, 1990, Big Red (9-1) vs. Rayland Buckeye Local Panthers (10-0) at Death Valley.

When push came to shove, team tackling bested well-timed trickery. And Steubenville Big Red advanced to the Ohio Division II, Region 5 championship game with a 26-7 high school victory over Buckeye Local before approximately 11,000 at Harding Stadium Friday night.

Panther coach Ron Pobolish came up with the well-timed trickery-calling for a reverse on a kick return following Steubenville's first touchdown of the game. Scott DeYarmon fielded the boot, ran 5 yards towards the left sideline and handed the ball to Jamie Tonkovich headed toward the right sideline. The senior speedster sped 85 yards to paydirt, juking kicker Mike Jones near midfield and reaching the endzone untouched. "I'm still trying to figure out what happened on that play," Big Red coach Reno Saccoccia smiled. "They had us fooled there." Saccoccia could afford to smile-Big Red answered the play by scoring 3 more touchdowns of its own on its next 5 possessions. Wade Manns turned the momentum back in his team's direction by returning the Buckeye kickoff 40 yards to midfield, setting up a time-consuming, 15 play, 50-yard drive for the go-ahead touchdown. Quent Thornton-who carried the ball a personal high 24 times on the night-scored on a 5-yard run. Big Red's first drive was a 9 play, 58-yard march that ended with a 16-yard run by quarterback Anthony Reda on an option. "Wade's runback was a big one," Saccoccia allowed. "He quieted their crowd and got us on a roll. Buckeye Local is a good football team-they played hard and hit hard. I thought coach Pobolish and his staff did a great job of preparing for this game." What the Panthers knew they had to avoid, they didn't-Big Red's ball control attack. Steubenville would rush the football 66 times for 331 yards and ran 83 plays to Buckeye Local's 40 on the night. "We know we're not going to do that every night," Saccoccia said of controlling the football. "But it's nice to see we can be effective with our fullback and force people to stop him." Big Red's 2-minute offense posted a key score in the game as well. Trailing 14-7, Pobolish elected to go for the 1st down on 4th and 9 from the Big Red 44. Michael "Buster" Tillman's coverage on Tonkovich forced an incomplete pass, however, Steubenville taking possession with 49 seconds left in the half. Reda's quarterback draw went for 20 yards. He connected for 19 stripes to Doug Knight on a sideline route, a late hit by the Panthers pushing the ball to the Buckeye 9-yard line. With 13 seconds left, Darius "D-Train" Alexander scored on a 7-yard run. The PAT failed, but Steubenville had a 20-7 lead at intermission.

"That score helped them a great deal," Pobolish said. "But the way they were beating us in the trenches....I don't think it was that big of a key in the game." Buckeye Local managed 157 yards in offense. The Panthes averaged 469 yards per game during the regular season. Steubenville would put together one more scoring drive in the 2nd half, Thornton's 1-yard plunge capping a 15 play, 55-yard touchdown drive that ate another 6:13 off the clock in the 3rd quarter. Penalties nullified would-be touchdown runs of 75 and 37 yards by Alexander. "We made some mistakes that hurt us, but when you play hard, mistakes are going to happen," Saccoccia said. "Really, the weren't factors in the game." Mistakes hurt Buckeye all evening in the form of turnovers. The Panthers lost 3 fumbles and were intercepted twice on the night. Buckeye Local's deepest penetration offensively was the Big Red 31-yard line twice, both drives ending in turnovers. DeYarmon tried hitting Craig Neavin on a slotback option pass in the 2nd quarter, but Jon "Juice" Collier intercepted the ball. Billy West tried sweeping the left side in the 4th quarter and fumbled, Rob Fayak recovering the ball. It was Fayak's 2nd fumble recovery of the night. Jeff Bernard recovered a fumble and Aaron Pease intercepted a Terry Boyd pass for Steubenville as well. Coach Saccoccia commented on next week's game, the Region 5 final, against Uniontown Lake. "It should be another great game. We played them in Canton two years ago and we've scrimmaged them the past 6 years."

 

Regional Final, Friday November 9th, 1990, Big Red (10-1) vs. Uniontown Lake Blue Streaks (10-1) at Canton's Fawcett Stadium.

This time of year in high school football is about more than winning. It is about staying alive. Steubenville Big Red stayed alive Friday evening at Fawcett Stadium in Canton, making Mike Jones' 38-yard field goal on the first play of the 4th quarter stand up for a 10-7 victory over Uniontown Lake.

The victory marked Steubenville's 4th consecutive region championship and sends it into the Division II semifinals next weekend. Big Red will reportedly meet Columbus DeSales-a 20-7 winner over Columbus Briggs-in one semifinal game next weekend while St. Marys Memorial will meet Fostoria in the other. Official pairings, sites and times will be determined Sunday. "Right now, this game, is about guts," Big Red coach Reno Saccoccia said. "Both teams showed a lot of guts out there tonight, but our kids did what they had to do. Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die to get there. Our kids paid the price. Our kids died out there tonight." The teams were deadlocked at 7 at intermission, Big Red getting even late in the half on an 80-yard scoring play. Anthony Reda connected with Michael "Buster" Tillman across the middle for 20 yards. Tillman, running toward the far sideline, eluded defenders with a cut to the outside and rambled the rest of the way down the sideline for the score. The play marked only Big Red's second first down of the game. The contest was played in a steady rain and muddy field conditions. Big Red suffered 6 turnovers-losing 5 fumbles-but perservered for the victory. "We just couldn't do anything in the first half....we couldn't get any field position," Saccoccia lamented. "It was one of those things. Our kids were not playing badly, but we were making mistakes. All we could do was hang in there. I'd have been happy going to the locker room down 7-0. Bob Radakovich (offensive coordinator) called the crossing pattern to Tillman from upstairs. I hate that play-Buster got his clock cleaned twice on it last week-here it goes for a touchdown." Other than that play, Big Red could not move the ball into Lake territory until midway through the 3rd quarter. Reda scrambled for a pair of first downs on 3rd down runs and Darius "D-Train" Alexander broke loose for 19 yards on an option play to key a 13 play, 59-yard march ending in the field goal. The snap skidded across the wet turf, but holder Jeff Grill handled the ball and got it in place for the boot. "It was a great play," Saccoccia alluded. "But Jeff was only doing his job. That's why we feed these guys pizza before the game. They have to earn their meals."

Big Red appeared ready to salt the game away late in the 4th quarter. Quent Thornton burst through the middle for 34 yards and Pete Basil caught a Reda pass for 32. Thornton broke through the middle for an apparent gain to the Lake 5, but Brian Collins stole the ball from his grasp and nearly broke clear the other way before getting hauled down at the Lake 22 with 6:35 to play. "We practice taking the ball away like that and Brian's good at it," Lake coach Jeff Durbin pointed out. "He must have caused about 7 fumbles this year trying to steal the ball away like that." Shaking his head, Saccoccia said, "Even when we came up with a good play...something wrong would happen. But the weather is no excuse. We have to hang on to the ball no matter the conditions. The weather took away the one advantage we had on them tonight-our outside speed and overall team speed." The Steubenville defense allowed only 2 first downs in the 2nd half, though, and kept the Blue Streaks out of scoring position the rest of the way. Big Red moved to 11-1, is 6-0 in 2nd round playoff games and has won 10 straight playoff games on natural turf. The victory was Saccoccia's 90th as a head coach.

The Steubenville defense limited the Blue Streaks to 112 yards on 40 running plays and held quarterback Chris Meffert to 6 completions in 22 attempts for 52 yards. Reda completed 4 of 13 passes for 122 yards for Big Red. Alexander had 14 carries for 64 yards, Thornton 9 for 59. A bizzare 1st half saw Lake's Chris Spardy run as many plays (17) as the Big Red offense. The Blue Streaks had possession inside the Steubenville 20-yard line 4 times because of Big Red mistakes as well. Still, the score at intermission was merely 7-7. Lake's first opportunity came late in the 1st quarter when Doug Knight fumbled a punt and the Blue Streaks' Eric Brock recovered at the Big Red 12. Wade Manns turned away that opportunity, however, intercepting a Meffert pass at the 4-yard line on 3rd down. When Big Red failed to move the ball-its offense managed just 2 first downs in the first half-Lake regained possession on the Steubenville 32. The defense stiffined again and Kurt Meffert was short on a 26-yard fieldgoal attempt. Big Red was guilty of roughing the kicker, however, setting up Matt Christopher's 2-yard plunge and a 7-0 Blue Streak lead with 8:34 left in the half. Reda fumbled the snap on Big Red's next possession, Lake's Ryan Turns recovering at the Steubenville 40. A fake punt resulted in a 20-yard scamper by Christopher, but Big Red held on downs a few plays later at the 16-yard line. Brent Turns intercepted a Reda pass late in the half, returning the ball 20 yards to the Steubenville 16. Again, Big Red's defense held and Meffert was short on a 26-yard field goal attempt with 1:21 showing on the clock. Steubenville took possession at its own 20 and Tillman dropped a Reda pass on first down. Reda went back to Tillman on 2nd down, hitting him on the crossing pattern 20 yards downfield. Tillman cut outside of 4 Lake defenders and got to the far sideline, sprinting the remaining distance for an 80-yard touchdown with 1:02 showing on the clock. Jones' PAT knotted the game. Lake ran off 42 plays in the first 2 quarters to Big Red's 17. Steubenville was plagued by 4 turnovers in the first 24 minutes, losing 3 fumbles. Jon "Juice" Collier's 7th interception of the year ended a mild Lake threat near the end of the half.

The locker room jubilation was all-encompassing after the game. "Our defense won this game," quarterback Anthony Reda said. "Man, their defense was good and we couldn't get it going. But our defense was just as good. Our defense kept us in striking distance." George Vudrogovic, Don "Butch" Brown, Nate Burress, Steve Terry and friends were stuffing the line of scrimmage all night. Wade Manns and Andre McGhee were knocking potential receptions out of Lake receivers' hands. "We knew we had to keep them out of the endzone in the 1st half," Vudrogovic said. "It was only a matter of time before our offense hit some big plays. The big plays won the game. They do it every game. It's no fun playing the line in the mud," he declared. "There just wasn't any footing. You can't drive off your blocks or sustain anything. Against a defense like theirs, that really hurt us. Still, if we get 2 or 3 big plays per game, I think we can win it. And we've been getting 2 or 3 big plays every game so far, if not more." Reda confessed, "I could grip the ball OK, but I was worried about throwing it too hard early in the game. I was afraid it might slip out of my hand. Just before halftime, coach Radakovich told me to start cutting the ball loose, to throw the ball naturally."

 

State Semifinal, Friday November 16th, 1990, Big Red (11-1) vs. Columbus DeSales Stallions (10-2) at Zanesville's Sulsberger Stadium.

Things just didn't work out. That is the easiest way to describe Steubenville Big Red's 13-0 Ohio Division II semifinal loss to Columbus DeSales Friday night in the rain at Zanesville's Sulsberger Stadium. The Stallions posted a pair of 2nd quarter touchdowns and made them stand up for the win.

The key to the contest may well have been the goalline stand by DeSales early in the 4th quarter. Big Red had kept the ball for 16 plays, taking possession with 5:15 left in the 3rd quarter. In its lone sustained drive of the night, Steubenville ate 7 minutes off the clock. The final play of the quarter was a dive play of fullback Quent Thornton on 4th and 1, nettng a first down at the DeSales 8-yard line. An offsides penalty pushed the ball to the 4. Four consecutive handoffs to Thornton through the middle moved it to the 1. But no closer. DeSales took possession, ran off 12 straight plays itself, took the clock down to less than 4 minutes and the game was over. "We had a chance to show some authority there," Big Red coach Reno Saccoccia said of the gives to Thornton. "We were trying to score, obviously, but also set up something on the next drive. We ran the same plays that worked for us all year...they just didn't work out this time. It just wasn't meant to be for us, I guess. But our kids played hard. They always play hard." DeSales coach Bob Jacoby said, "We build around our defense. We feel we have a pretty good defense. We thought we had a pretty good defense 3 years ago....and Steubenville blew us away." Jacoby was the defensive coordinator of the DeSales team that dropped a 35-17 decision to Big Red in the 1987 playoffs. But the 1990 game was a different story. Not known as a passing team and starting a sophomore quarterback, both DeSales' touchdowns came through the air. Big Red limited the Stallions' vaunted running game to 124 yards on 39 carries, barely 3 yards per crack. "We try to take what the defense gives us," Jacoby shrugged. "Our receivers always joke that they're nothing more than skinny lineman. Tonight we got them into the game." Big Red missed 3 chances to score near the Stallion goal line, getting inside on the opposing 10-yard line twice in vain. "We just didn't finish things off," Saccoccia related. "We had opportunities at the beginning of the game and in the 3rd quarter. You have to take advantage of those things. Championship teams come up with championship plays. Our kids did that-they did more than we could have asked of them. Our assistant coaches did a great job. I didn't have our team totally ready to play this game. I have to tak e responsibility for that." Big Red's ground game managed just 63 yards on 37 carries. Darius "D-Train" Alexander had 12 carries for 44 yards to pace Big Red, falling 34 yards shy of the 1,000 yard mark. Steve Smith paced DeSales with 25 carries for 83 yards. While Big Red ends its season at 11-2, DeSales enters the Division II title game with the same record. DeSales will meet St. Marys Memorial, a 21-8 winner over Fostoria Friday night, one week from today in Massillon's Paul Brown Tiger Stadium.

"We were in this game the whole way," Saccoccia said. "They didn't drive that much on us. That last drive they had in the 4th quarter...it was after we had been stopped at the goal line and our hearts were pretty much popped." The first half proved a study in frustration for Big Red, which failed to score during 3 possessions in DeSales territory while watching the Stallions find the endzone on their first two ventures into the Big Red side of the turf. Steubenville received a break on the first snap of the game, Nate Burress recovering a fumbled handoff at the DeSales 28-yard line. Reda's 16-yard pass to Alexander took the ball closer, but the brief drive stalled and Mike Jones' 28-yard field goal attempt was blocked. Doug Knight's 21-yard punt return set Big Red up at the DeSales 27 on its next possession, but Luke Fickell nailed Reda for a 5-yard loss on a 3rd down option play, forcing a punt. The Stallion used 3 big plays to key a 54-yard march for the game's first score. Fullback Chad Young broke off runs of 18 and 11 yards before quarterback Brian Emmerling connected with tight end Fickell for a 19-yard touchdown pass with 11:17 left in the half. Fickell drew Jon "Juice" Collier in single coverage on the play, but leaped high and pulled down the aerial in stride over the middle. Big Red would bang out a pair of 1st downs late in the 2nd quarter, the latter putting the ball at the DeSales 28. Reda was hit for a 3-yard loss by Adam Asbeck on the next play, however, knocking the drive out of synch. Big Red would get the ball once more in the first half, the possession ending in disaster. Reda's pass was intercepted by Chalaco Clark whose 17-yard return set up the Stallions at the Big Red 23 with 19 seconds remaining. On the next play, Emmerling floated wounded-duck toward the endzone and Mike Merrick slide under it after Michael "Buster" Tillman and Collier lost their footing on the wet turf. Tillman blocked John Mahle's PAT, leaving the score 13-0 at intermission. Reda completed 3 of 10 passes with 2 interceptions in the 1st half. The Steubenville offense managed just 56 yards in 29 plays during the first 2 quarters. The crowd was estimated at 7,500 with about 6,000 of those supporting the Big Red. After the game, Saccoccia said, "To beat us, you have to kill us. That's the best way to describe our program," he said quietly. Even DeSales coach Jacoby did not feel comfortable with a 13-0 lead at halftime. "When you're playing Steubenville, you're not comfortable until the game is over," Jacoby sighed. "Our kids don't quit," Saccoccia declared. "I don't think it's sad, the way our seniors are going out. I don't think it's sad at all. They left their legacy for Big Red football. They left something for our juniors and sophomores to follow. That's what kept this program going. We always have a good crop of kids coming back, but that means nothing," Saccoccia said, "These kids have to keep working hard to improve. If they don't, they won't grow as a team."

 

 

1990~
AAndre McGhee rb
Mike "Buster" Tillman wr
Jon "Juice" Collier db
Brad Reid de
Anthony Reda qb
Mike Jones k
Darius "D-Train" Alexander tb
Wade Manns wr
Jeff Grill qb
Shane Nalepa qb
Chris Snider fb
Ricky Fletcher fb
Mark Palmer te
Tyrone Roseberry rb
Steve Terry lb
Aaron Nestor wr
Doug Knight wr
Jeff Bernard lb
Quent Thornton fb
Pete Basil db
Hakim Edwards wr
Richard Mayers db
Jamie Styles db
Jason Shackleford wr
Matt Shepherd wr
Robert Fayak te
Jim Babella wr
James Keaton dt
Phil Freeman wr
Anthony Mahfood g
Jeryl Smallwood te
Aaron Pease g
Damarius Dokes t
Jamie Smith g
Roger Stanley lb
Todd Anderson c
Joe Atkins t
Ed Stroud t
Ken Talamine t
Chris Elliot g
Iko Culbreath g
Chad Milosevich c
David Lamatrice g
Nate Burress g
Corey Tomasso lb
Hugh Bolen g
Scott Kosek t
John Thompson t
George Vudrogovic g
Chris McClain t
Jamar Yetts g
Donald Brown g
Jason Yoder t
Sanford Fletcher t
Tony Smith end
Bill Murray end
Jodi Hargrove wr
Trey Hargrove wr
Matt Boomhower end
Lewis Kicks wr
Shawn Kerr wr
Bill Poplowski wr
Jeff Mazur g