No matter how well-executed the play or how good the game, or even how great the overall effort in the end, there is always that next snap, that next game. Football coaches, like every coach in every sport, preach that until they’re croaky … and a little cranky, too.

So it shouldn’t come as a surprise if a few of the boys around the Pioneer Athletic Conference are a bit hoarse today.

The league’s first full round of games last weekend sure didn’t play out as a lot of the coaches expected. They sure didn’t play out the way most of their players and fans had scripted, either.

Boyertown, the team so many felt could run the table this season and the team that left few thinking otherwise after overwhelming its two preseason opponents, lost. It lost to Pottstown, which has definitely given the Bears more than their share of challenges through the years, but to a team that has had opportunities to win in the past before a critical mistake led to the surrender of a late lead and, of course, a loss. This time, though, Pottstown forced the critical mistake, capitalized on the opportunity to take a late lead and, of course, won.

It may have been just one game, but it may — the emphasis is on may — go a long way in determining what direction both Boyertown and Pottstown are headed. And there’s no time, absolutely none, to dwell on what developed last Friday night.

No time, because this week Boyertown has to entertain Pottsgrove – a team that has either won or contended for a PAC-10 title for more years than most of the anti-Falcon fan following cares to remember, and a team that seemed to have fixed whatever offensive or defensive predicaments they may have had in a 67-7 rout of Upper Perkiomen. No time, because this week Pottstown has to travel to Perkiomen Valley – a team that gained a little identity and a whole lot of confidence with last week’s win over Owen J. Roberts, and a team Pottstown hasn’t beaten the last eight times they’ve met, or since the Trojans’ last championship season back in 2002.
John Strickler/the Mercury Pottsgrove’s Mark Dukes (6), who leads the area in rushing, had four touchdowns in the Falcons’ thrashing of Upper Perkiomen on Friday.

As if that isn’t enough for one Friday night, there’s also Spring-Ford visiting Upper Perkiomen and Owen J. Roberts heading down to Phoenixville – a pair of matchups oh so similar in importance to the two already mentioned.

The Rams, by their own admission, looked good for a half and not-so-good for the other half against Pope John Paul II. One half won’t get it done against Upper Perkiomen, which has had its own share of playing “partials” before the collapse against Pottsgrove. A Spring-Ford win this week only sets up yet another key showdown next week with Pottsgrove. Upper Perkiomen, felt by many in the preseason to be a PAC-10 contender as well but slowed considerably of late by a few injuries, obviously cannot afford another early loss if it hopes to stay in the chase. So that, along with last week’s embarrassing loss, sure has fueled the competitive fires.

Owen J. Roberts, meanwhile, needs to find the game it unveiled in a win up in Reading two weeks ago. Phoenixville, 3-0 for the first time in six years, is no longer under the radar. The Phantoms showed their resiliency last Saturday at Methacton by coming back time and time again. They were at their best on their final possession, which covered 71 yards and ate up all but 20 seconds of the game’s last 3:06, and then on their final defensive stance by holding the Warriors out of the end zone on the game’s last play.

Oh, don’t forget Saturday’s matinee, either. Methacton is back at Pope John Paul. The Warriors could and likely will create a lot of trouble in the league, and they’re playing a PJP team that one coach has already admitted, “scares the living you-know-what out of you every time they snap the football.”

And to think all of this ahead is just Week Two of the PAC-10 season...

Officials’ whistles are being heard and heard often. Penalties are up, way up from previous seasons. Ironically, the teams getting the most flags thrown at them are among the area’s best – Upper Perkiomen (25 penalties), Spring-Ford (23), Boyertown (22), Daniel Boone (21) and Pottstown (20). … OJR may want to throw a curse on No. 396. That’s exactly how many yards the Wildcats gave up to both Conestoga and Perkiomen Valley – both losses. … The Pottsgrove-Upper Perkiomen annual affair is the PAC-10’s highest-scoring series with 1,271 points put up on the board between the two rivals – an average of 49 a game. … Pottstown’s 35 points last week was the most a Trojans team has scored in a league game since a 53-7 romp over St. Pius X during Week One of the 2008 season. … Pottsgrove’s 522 yards rushing tied the league’s second-best mark, while PJP’s 306 yards passing is the league eighth-best mark.

Three St. Pius X graduates are coaching in the Berks Football League and enter their respective conference schedules this week with a combined 63 preseason mark. Daniel Boone’s Dave Bodolus leads the threesome at 3-0, while Schuylkill Valley’s Jeff Chillot is 2-1, and Berks Catholic’s Rick Keeley is 1-2. … Yet another Pius grad, Perkiomen School head coach Tom Clavario, is 1-1 so far. … Four other former PAC-10 coaches are a combined 5-7. They are Marple-Newtown’s Ray Gionta (Boyertown and St. Pius X) at 3-0; Cardinal O’Hara’s Dan Algeo (Phoenixville) at 2-1; Hempfield’s Ron Zieber (Boyertown) at 0-3; and Lansdale Catholic’s tireless Jim Algeo at 0-3.

Daniel Boone is one of three BFL Section One teams that finished the non-league portion of their seasons at 3-0. Conrad Weiser and Exeter are the others, while Pottsville and Governor Mifflin are currently 2-1. Muhlenberg and Reading are both 1-2, and Twin Valley – which travels to Daniel Boone

this Friday evening – went 0-for-3.

Hill School came up short against Germantown Academy in last week’s opener that kicked off the program’s 125t season of football. New head coach Grey Simpson wasn’t completely disappointed in the effort.

“Although the first game did not end on the scoreboard as we all would have liked, I think we came away with some positive things we can build on for Week Two,” Simpson said. “Most important, for the coaching staff and the players, we have some film to look at this week to help in the teaching of what we are trying to accomplish on offense, defense and special teams. From (the coaching staff) standpoint, that has been the biggest issue in not playing a scrimmage and having very little quality live action.”

The Rams lost eight days of practices and a scrimmage due to students being sent home prior to Hurricane Irene’s arrival in the Pottstown area. They return to the field this week at Episcopal Academy, which is 1-2 – each loss by seven points.

This column originally ran in the Nov. 16 edition of The Mercury.

Pioneer Athletic Conference football teams haven’t exactly been pounding on the postseason doors, at least not in District 1’s Class AAAA bracket since the league kicked off its inaugural season back in 1986.

Four appearances, or four games. Four losses.

Now matter how you break it down, that’s 0-fer, or 0-for-4.

Boyertown lost first four years ago, Perkiomen Valley was next the following year, and both Boyertown and Owen J. Roberts came up short last weekend. With the possible exception of the Vikings’ 36-26 loss to Glen Mills in 2007 and the Bears’ 21-13 setback to Rustin last Friday night, none were too competitive.

The disappointing trend doesn’t appear as though it’ll change anytime soon, either.

For starters, the current enrollment classifications are locked in for another year, so no one – good, bad or different – is going anywhere in the four brackets. To make matters seem even worse, the Pioneer Athletic Conference’s five AAAA teams – Boyertown, Methacton, Owen J. Roberts, Perkiomen Valley and Spring-Ford – will soon be taking a very noticeable hit when a good portion of their respective lineups graduate in June.

No one really wants to debate how the five schools size up against the rest of the district — or state — either, although there are grounds to seriously debate the need for adjusting all four brackets as well as adding a fifth to the alignment (which the PIAA has looked into, chatted about and tossed off the proposal table).

Of the 45 schools in the district’s AAAA division, Boyertown is ninth (866 students) and Spring-Ford is two back in 11th (856). Those numbers may appear to be in line with the big school enrollments, but not when you see the Top Four – from Neshaminy, Pennsbury and Upper Darby up to No. 1 North Penn – range from 1,295 to 1,538 students. Those numbers dwarf the enrollment figures for Perkiomen Valley’s (702) and Methacton (702), which are situated at No. 24 and No. 27, respectively. And Owen J. Roberts (562), which moved up into the Class AAAA bracket this year, is the seventh smallest school.

Does size really matter? No official

poll has been taken, mind you, but results – or history – tend to support that thought.

Three District 1 schools, all among the big boys, have won a combined seven Class AAAA state titles. Central Bucks West, which owns five of them, was considerably bigger than its current enrollment (732) when winning all five because they were accomplished prior to the district’s split to a third school (Central Bucks South). The remaining two have been won by Neshaminy and North Penn.

The list of district champions since 1992 is dominated by the big boys, too, with the exception of Coatesville (now No. 13 on the enrollment chart) and Plymouth-Whitemarsh (now No. 33), who won in 1992 and 1995, respectively. Central Bucks West owns five, again all before the split from two to three schools; North Penn owns four; and Neshaminy, Ridley and Downingtown – before the split to two schools – own two apiece; and Pennsbury owns one.

It’s probably no surprise that all but two of the 18 district champions in Class AAA have been won by the bracket’s big boys, too. Strath Haven, currently No. 4 on the AAA enrollment chart – and just 24 students from being No. 1 – owns exactly half of those 18 titles. Seven others were won by schools that are now AAAA. The remaining two were won by Upper Merion and Pottsgrove, currently No. 13 and No. 12, respectively, in enrollments.

The Pioneer Athletic Conference’s remaining five non-AAAA schools are all in the district’s AAA bracket, which numbers 20 in all. Ironically, after Pottsgrove, the four others – Upper Perkiomen (No. 15), Phoenixville (No. 17), Pope John Paul II (No. 19) and Pottstown (No. 20) – occupy two of the bottom six rungs in the bracket. They’ve fared considerably better, though, with a 15-24 overall mark in the district playoffs, but with just one district champion (Pottsgrove last year).

A lot, not all, coaches feel enrollments usually dictate a program’s success within their own leagues as well as in district and state postseason playoffs, too. Others shrug off the notion.

A lot, not all, favor a fifth bracket. Others are willing to listen.

Bottom line, there is absolutely too much of a disparity from the top to bottom in Class AAAA. It’s an issue that needs to be addressed.

*

Downingtown East’s offense has gotten a lot of attention this season, but the defense deserved all the headlines after last Friday night’s AAAA rout of Owen J. Roberts. The Cougars dominated the front line and held Ryan Brumfield to 42 yards on 22 carries and, more important, kept him out of the end zone.

To put that in perspective it was the fewest yards Brumfield had since the next-to-last game of his sophomore year, when Lower Moreland held him to 32 in the second round of the District 1-AAA playoffs; it was the first time Brumfield was held under 100 yards since the opening game of his junior year; and it was the first time Brumfield was held out of the end zone since the Lower Moreland game.

Brumfield will go into his final game Thanksgiving morning against Pottstown with 8,323 career rushing yards, or No. 4 on Pennsylvania’s career rushing chart. He needs three to pass Schuylkill Haven’s Zach Barket and 110 to pass East Stroudsburg South’s James Mungro to finish No. 2 to Steelton-Highspire’s Jeremiah Young (9,027).

*

The Mid-Atlantic Prep League has tie-breakers in the event two or more teams tie for the championship, and that can happen a lot with a membership of just six teams.

The first tie-breaker is head-to-head competition, which denied The Hill School a share of the title with Lawrenceville after the Rams dropped their first MAPL game to the Larries last Saturday, 21-14, and the two schools finished with identical 5-1 records. Had both teams been unbeaten going into the game, that tie-breaker – if there should even be one in the first place – is acceptable. And if there were playoffs – which there are not – where a seeding must be determined, head-to-head is acceptable.

So, if Hill was good enough to beat Hun two weeks ago, which Lawrenceville couldn’t do last month, it’s literally unfair to deny anyone a share of the title.

With all due respect to the league administrators, 5-1 is 5-1. It’s what you do over an entire season, not one weekend.

*

Don Seeley is the sports editor of The Mercury. His high school football column runs Tuesdays and Fridays through Thanksgiving.

This column originally ran in the Oct. 16 edition of The Mercury.

LOWER POTTSGROVE — No one should be surprised Pottsgrove is situated on top of the Pioneer Athletic Conference standings and unbeaten through six games overall. And very few should be surprised Owen J. Roberts is right up there alongside Pottsgrove and unbeaten through six games as well.

The big question is if either the Falcons or the Wildcats have any surprises for one another when they meet tonight.

Don’t expect many.

Especially any of those scrupulous, out-of-the-blue, razzle-dazzle offensive schemes, or devious defensive designs, either.

“Every team has their gadgets, a trick play or two they go to once in a while,” said OJR head coach Tom Barr. “But in a game like this you go with what brought you here, what got you to 6-0 at this point.”

“You don’t win football games with (trick) plays,” added Pottsgrove head coach Rick Pennypacker. “It all comes down to fundamentals, who blocks and who tackles.”

Neither Barr nor Pennypacker have reached into the gadget bag this season to pull out a win. Quite the opposite, as a matter of fact.

It’s all been rather plain and simple.

Owen J. Roberts runs the football, Pottsgrove runs the football. They’ve only gone up top a combined 50 times thus far, which reveals just how much both like to pound it, pound it, and pound it some more … inside or outside, wherever their very good offensive lines lead them – the Wildcats to the tune of 285 yards a game, the Falcons to the tune of 275 yards a game.

The Wildcats’ front of center Mike Nowak, guards Jesse Dugan and Sean Moloney, tackles Andrew Garson and Kyle Moore, and tight end Francis Polignano – along with fullback Rich Zazo – have executed rather well in opening lanes for Ryan Brumfield. Six games in and Brumfield already has 1,222 yards and 20 touchdowns – both area-highs and among the leaders in all of Pennsylvania.

“Ryan Brumfield is as good a running back as I have ever seen,” Pennypacker said. “He reminds me of some great backs we’ve all seen the way he sets up his blocks. He gets the ball out in space, looks and looks for that block and, boom, off he goes. He is so good.”

The Wildcats also proved last week – when quarterback Nate Walters flipped a pair of touchdown passes covering 60 and 40 yards to wing Sam Funk – that they can go up top if needed, if only to lessen the presence of too many Falcons in the box. And Funk is equally dangerous on the counters OJR has called on at opportune times for 25 or more seasons, too.

But for Brumfield and the rest of the Wildcats to get off the ball and run like they have this season, they’ll have to do it against a defense unlike any they’ve seen yet.

“They’re quick and they get to the ball,” Barr said of Pottsgrove’s 5-2 defense, which is permitting an average of just 107 yards on the ground and 192 overall. “We have Brumfield, but (Pottsgrove) makes it very difficult to get out on the perimeter. Their technique is so good. But their quickness off the ball and their quickness to the ball can scare you.”

The Falcons go with T.J. Demetrio on the nose, in between tackles Kayvon Greene and Tyler Wysochanski, while Justin Oliveri and Maika Polamalu are situated on the ends. Brad Thornton and Danny Michaels have been superb at linebacker, especially Michaels in filling in for injured returning all-state senior Preston Hamlette – whose is questionable for tonight’s affair. And behind all of that group is a secondary that usually features Angelo Berry, Terrell Chestnut and Scott Madl, with Fred Dukes and Isaiah Quick getting into the rotation.

Owen J. Roberts’ defense – a 4-3 set – has actually been even less generous than the Falcons. The Wildcats are surrendering an average of 111 yards on the ground and just 172 overall. Ends Steve Lawless and Kyle Moore and tackles Moloney and Nowak have been relentless up front and getting into opponents’ backfields. Zazo is the middle linebacker, situated in between Nate Blevins and Funk to give OJR “as solid a group of linebackers as there are,” according to Pennypacker. And the Wildcats’ secondary – Brendan Shoemaker and Sean Yeager on the corners and Polignano and Brumfield as the safeties – can match up with most any other.

Nonetheless, the Wildcats will have to deal with a Pottsgrove offense that has the ability to find the end zone at any time from anywhere on the field.

“Last year it seemed like all you had to deal with was Chestnut (at quarterback),” Barr said. “But now they have more than just Chestnut. They have Polamalu, who averages something like 10 yards a carry; Berry, who really runs hard; and Greene, who has been in the backfield of late and runs so well, too. All of those guys are fast. It’s their speed that concerns us.”

What concerns both Barr and Pennypacker are turnovers … or avoiding turnovers.

The Wildcats have had their share of problems holding onto the football this season. They have fumbled away 12 possessions – though just one the last two weeks. And that just happens to coincide with what the Falcons have done thus far – like recover a dozen of their opponents’ bobbles, which has helped define why they are at plus-12 in takeaways.

“Pottsgrove executes so well on offense,” Barr said. “But what makes them so good is that when they get a turnover they turn it into points. I don’t know how many times they’ve done that this year, but that’s what a good football team does.”

“Don’t try to kid anybody, though,” Pennypacker said. “Owen J. is a very good football team, a very sound football team … and probably the best football team we’ll see, at least until the playoffs.”

So it should be a good one.

“We just going to line up and go at one another,” Barr said. “We’ve been doing that for the last couple of years.”

“I think it’s going to be a battle,” Pennypacker said.

NOTES

Pottsgrove leads the PAC-10 series, 12-9, while Owen J. Roberts leads the overall series, 31-19-3. … Falcons dealt OJR its lone league loss last season, 41-14, which Pennypacker said should help fuel the Wildcats’ competitive fires. “I think you have to look at the revenge factor too,” Pennpacker said. “(OJR) has something to prove.” … Polamalu is third in the area in rushing (579 yards, 8.9 per carry average). … Walters is 12 of 21 for 333 yards and three touchdowns, while Chestnut is 17 of 29 for 234 yards and two touchdowns. Each of the quarterbacks have been intercepted once. … Both teams have reliable kickers in Zack Lepore (OJR) and Zach Robinson (Pottsgrove). … The teams have had just one common opponent thus far – Spring-Ford. OJR outlasted the Rams, 13-7, four weeks ago, while Pottsgrove got by the Rams, 20-6, last Friday night.