By Richard L. Gaw
Staff Writer

The renewed rivalry that played out last Friday evening at Kennett Stadium between the Kennett and Unionville high school varsity football teams was – as it has been for several years – everything it was anticipated to be.

It was a tale of two halves.

It was a plotline of divergent possessions, dotted with peaks and valleys.

It was a good old-fashioned Ches-Mont barnburner that came down to the closing seconds.

Behind a late fourth-quarter touchdown pass from Garrett McCracken to Hunter Taylor, the Blue Demons overcame a furious Longhorn second-half comeback attempt to defeat Unionville, 24-21, and improve their overall record to 7-1.

While it may have ended in dramatic fashion, the Oct. 10 tilt between the two rivals began in a herky-jerky manner, as both teams racked up a series of penalties that killed rallies. After Shay Barker’s 20-yard field goal with 7:55 left in the first quarter gave Kennett a 3-0 lead, the scoring remained a stalemate until McCracken found Joalex Carabajal in the corner of the end zone for a 17-yard touchdown pass with 2:14 left in the first half that gave Kennett a 10-0 lead. 

For the majority of the first half, Kennett’s defense was unkind to Unionville’s offensive attempts, hurrying quarterback Tommy McGinnis and thwarting consecutive possessions. After Carabajal’s touchdown, the Longhorns inherited the ball on their 20-yard line, but after a keeper that gained 11 yards, McGinnis’ pass attempt was batted around near midfield and collared in by Matthew Reidenberg, who ran the ball to the 21-yard line with 1:08 left in the first half. 

On the first snap, McCracken found a wide-open Carabajal with 1:03 left in the half to send the Blue Demons into halftime with a 17-0 lead.

If Unionville’s first half was defined by its inability to establish any ground game, then its second half could be categorized as “the Brody McLaughlin comeback.” The senior running back, who was forced to leave last Friday night’s game against Avon Grove with an injury, suddenly reappeared at the start of the second half and kick-started his team’s comeback.

On Unionville’s first possession of the second half, McGinnis hit McLaughlin for a 44-yard touchdown strike with 8:36 left in the third quarter that narrowed Kennett’s lead to 17-7.

After Reidenberg was stopped on a fourth-and-four with 5:27 left in the quarter, Unionville took over on the 26-yard line. A McGinnis pass to Shane Gilday moved the ball to midfield, which was followed by two McGinnis keepers that got the ball to the 5-yard line and, with 2:50 remaining in the third quarter, McGinnis plunged for a 5-yard TD that made the score 17-14.

The tandem of McGinnis and McLaughlin were hardly finished for the night. With 1:03 left in the quarter, a McLaughlin carry to the 39-yard line set up a Gilday reception to the 23-yard line, and with 17.3 seconds remaining, McGinnis scampered through the Kennett defense for a go-ahead touchdown that gave Unionville a 21-17 lead heading into the fourth quarter.

After a Kennett punt gave Unionville the ball near midfield early in the fourth quarter, McGinnis proceeded to lead his team down the field with a series of QB keepers and a hand-off to Alex Gonzalez that moved the ball to the 4-yard line. 

With 6:47 remaining in the game, however, Hayden Schumaker made the defensive play of the game when he recovered a fumble and ran the ball back to the 17-yard line that set up the McCracken to Taylor go-ahead touchdown with 5:50 left.

With less than a minute remaining in the game, McGinnis began engineering a drive that saw him complete passes to Hayden Wenturine, Drew Puleo and Shane Steenrod that moved the ball near midfield with 39 seconds left. After two incomplete passes and a delay of game penalty placed the ball at the 42-yard line on third-and-15, McGinnis avoided tacklers as the game clock ran out.

Kennett now sports a 2-1 record in the Ches-Mont American Division and will travel to Avon Grove on Oct. 17. Now 1-3 in the Ches-Mont American Division, Unionville will face Sun Valley at home on Oct. 17.

To contact Staff Writer Richard L. Gaw, email [email protected].