BY MITCH RUPERT

CORRESPONDENT

WEST PITTSTON — The football laid on the ground all by its lonesome on the Wyoming Area 25-yard line early in the second quarter. The product of a wind gust, which knocked the ball down before it ever got to a Warriors return man, the loose football was free for anyone to recover.

For Scranton Prep, it was an opportunity. And when the Cavaliers’ Brandon Farmer jumped on the ball without obstruction, it was disaster for No. 2 Wyoming Area. Scranton Prep had just taken a two-score lead and was starting to find its offensive rhythm. Now, it was knocking on the door of the red zone with a chance to make the Warriors’ 14-point deficit even bigger.

Scranton Prep needed just two plays to cash in the opportunity, and the writing was on the wall for the way Friday night’s District 2 Class 3A semifinal was going to play out. The No. 3 Cavaliers dominated every facet of the game and posted a 42-0 win at Jake Sobeski Field. The Cavaliers (6-5) now get a shot at their fifth consecutive District 2 championship in a season where they started 0-3. Scranton Prep travels to unbeaten Berwick, a 49-9 winner over Hanover Area, next week for the district title game.

“I’m proud of our kids. But, you know, enjoy it until (Saturday) and then you have to get back to work,” Scranton Prep coach Terry Gallagher said. “We’re going to face another really good football team next week. My hope is we got better this week, and we still have to get better next week because we want to continue to play.”

Coincidentally, it was an unintentional onsides kick a week ago, which ended up spring-boarding Wyoming Area to a win in its season finale against rival Pittston Area. But Tyler Bianchi’s second-quarter kickoff Friday following the second Will McPartland touchdown run looked nothing like an onsides kick. The football hovered into a gust of wind, which stole every ounce of momentum, and it fell between the upbacks and the Warriors’ three dangerous kick returners.

For a second or two, the ball sat on the grass just begging for anyone to pick it up. Enter Farmer, a sophomore who has been a special teams ace for the Cavaliers all season. Even once he jumped on the ball, nobody really jumped on him, as he had the ball all for himself.

Two plays later, McPartland handed the ball to Noah Krzywiec on a jet sweep to the left. Krzywiec initially bobbled the handoff before corralling it with his left hand behind his back. He then outran the Wyoming Area defense to the corner and tightroped the sideline to get inside the pylon for a 25-yard scoring run.

All of a sudden, Scranton Prep’s lead was 21-0. Wyoming Area hadn’t sniffed the end zone to that point, and it just allowed two scores in a matter of 17 seconds.

“Brandon is a maniac on special teams for us. He’s gonna be a really good football player, and I thought he made a huge play for us right there,” Gallagher said. “He probably had five tackles on special teams today, and he’s done it the last couple of weeks for us.”

“Yeah, that was a big play at the time, but we still had some opportunities,” Wyoming Area coach Randy Spencer said. “We had a couple forced turnovers and chances to create some plays, and we just didn’t capitalize on some of our opportunities.”

Three times in the first half Wyoming Area penetrated Scranton Prep’s side of the field, but its only real scoring opportunity ended 27 yards from the goal line when the first half clock ran out. The Warriors averaged less than 3 yards per play in the first half, while Scranton Prep churned out more than 10 yards a play and more than 18 yards per completion.

The 147 yards rushing by Wyoming Area was its third-lowest total of the season, and its 4.2 yards per carry were its fewest since a loss to Berwick in Week 6. Every time it felt like the Warriors had a crease for running back Nick Ciampi or quarterback Jack Gravine, the hole was quickly closed by a Scranton Prep defense, which not only hit like a runaway Mack truck but also flew to the football with the quickness and shiftiness of a gnat.

Wyoming Area was shut out at home for the first time since suffering a 21-0 defeat to Honesdale on Sept. 2, 2022.

“I thought our front seven played really well,” Gallagher said. “There were a couple times I thought we overpursued a little bit and Wyoming Area was able to cut it back. So that’s something we still have to work on. But again, they played really well.”

“When you’re playing against that level of players, yeah you have some things initially, but they run to the ball and they close things,” Spencer said. “Those plays that are big gainers against other teams, they minimize against a team like that. It’s the physicality, the hustle of running to the ball play in and play out. They certainly did a good job of executing that.”

The three-score lead in the second quarter was more than enough, but the Scranton Prep offense operated at peak efficiency all night. McPartland completed 11 of 13 passes for 204 yards and a touchdown, all in the first half.

The Cavaliers picked apart the Warriors defense with a short passing game and continuous screen passes, which left Scranton Prep receivers in one-on-one situations with defenders. And quite often, they won that matchup to gain extra yards.

“They put a bunch of guys in the box to try and slow the run game down,” Gallagher said of Wyoming Area’s defense. “So, we thought we had opportunities in our one-on-one matchups, including some of the things we do in terms of crossing routes, and we executed it. The kids made plays and then it opened up some stuff in terms of the run game in the second half.”

Now, a Cavaliers team, which had to battle just to finish the regular season at .500 thanks to a brutal early-season schedule and waiting for McPartland to return from a torn ACL, seems to be clicking on all cylinders. They took out a nine-win Wyoming Area team by rolling up nearly 400 yards of offense and keeping one of the best running games in District 2 from hitting the home runs it hit so often in recent weeks.

“I don’t think our record is indicative of who we are as a team, but you can cry and whine about how we should have done this or that,” Gallagher said. “You have two choices. You can sit here crying and point fingers at people, or you can toughen up, suck it up, get off the ground and start working. And if you do that, you get better. And my hope is that we’ve done that and we’ll continue to do that.”