Apollo-Ridge knocks off defending WPIAL champion Beaver Falls

By: HSSN Staff
Friday, September 8, 2017 | 10:51 PM

A confident Apollo-Ridge team rolled into Beaver Falls on Friday night and knocked off the defending WPIAL and PIAA champs 27-19 in a Class 3A nonconference game.

Senior quarterback Kyle Fitzroy passed for 84 yards and ran for 121 yards, including a 58-yard keeper on the game's third play before many of the fans had settled in at Geneva's Reeves Stadium.

Freshman running back Logan Harmon added 82 yards and a pair of scoring runs to pace the Vikings (3-0 overall, 1-0).

Playing with as many as four freshman on the field at once, Apollo-Ridge took a 27-7 lead with 9 minutes, 26 seconds to go and had to hold off a Tigers rally.

“This is huge for us and huge for our program and huge for those young kids we have playing,” Vikings coach John Skiba said. “We're building more and more experience. They don't have fear when they're out there.”

Beaver Falls (0-2, 0-1) exploded for two touchdowns in latter stages of the fourth period, but it wasn't enough to derail Apollo-Ridge as the Vikings ran out the final 2:57 of the contest.

“I'm pleased with our fight. We never game up,” Tigers first-year coach Nick Nardone said. “But this, ‘We're a young team' is starting to get old. We need to start improving. We had good days and bad days at practice this week. We can't afford, with our youth, to have bad days.”

Vikings junior linebacker Cody Peace made a big fourth-down stop on Torian Leak at the Vikings' 13 early in the game. Later in the first period, Ryan Bias blocked a Beaver Falls punt, and freshman Klayton Fitzroy picked up the ball at the 10 and went in for a touchdown to give Apollo-Ridge a 14-0 lead with 1:40 left.

“I'm proud of how the team came along the first couple of possessions,” Kyle Fitzroy said. “Special teams plays are important, and we got the lead and kept it up and got the outcome we wanted.”

After Apollo-Ridge lost the ball on downs at the Tigers' 16, Beaver Falls drove for its first touchdown of the season on a 52-yard pass from junior Dalyn Brickner to sophomore Noah Vaughn to trail, 14-7, at the half.

In a key momentum swing soon after the second-half kickoff, Beaver Falls had an apparent first down at the Apollo-Ridge 10 on a pass to Adam Brady. But an illegal shift penalty created a fourth-and-8 at the 23, and a pass fell incomplete to give the Vikings the ball.

Apollo-Ridge then drove 77 yards in nine plays, capped by Harmon's 28-yard scoring run, keeping his balance after he was hit at the 5.

Harmon again scored on an 11-yard run to cap a 10-play drive and put the Vikings up, 27-7.

“We talked about why you shouldn't be intimidated from what they have on the field,” Skiba said. “We're going to come out and play our game every week and try to execute and try to win.”

Apollo-Ridge did not commit any penalties during the game.

George Guido is a freelance writer.

Tags: Apollo-Ridge, Beaver Falls