Oct 2, 2015 4 min read

McDONALD – The hours of studying film and the even longer grind of going through practice at Fort Cherry’s field was meant for one thing.

Stop the potent passing attack of Avonworth, because that’s how you stop the Antelopes.

That was the plan, but plans don’t always go, well, as planned.

Avonworth unleashed quarterback Zach Chandler, a strapping 6-3 senior, on an overmatched Fort Cherry secondary and came away with a 28-6 victory in a Class A Black Hills Conference game Friday night.

Avonworth remained undefeated at 5-0 overall, and 3-0 in the conference, and kept pace with North Catholic, which defeated Riverside in a nonconference game.

Fort Cherry fell to 2-2 in the conference and 2-3 overall.

“Is that quarterback amazing or what?” Fort Cherry head coach Jim Shiel said.

Chandler was, completing 23 of 34 passes for 393 yards and four touchdowns, all in the first half.

“He’s the best I’ve seen in a long time,” said Shiel. “We wanted to put pressure on him. We changed our coverages and that didn’t stop him.”

The Rangers thought they caught a break before the game when Jamal Hughley, the WPIAL’s leader in receiving yards, was not dressed for the Antelopes. Hughley has 574 receiving yards on 19 receptions. He missed the game with a knee injury but is expected back for next week.

“He has a slight knee injury,” said Avonworth Duke Johncour. “It’s not serious.”

Garrett Day took advantage of Hughley’s absence by catching four first half touchdowns and leading Avonworth to a 28-0 lead at halftime. Day had eight receptions for 289 yards and snagged TD tosses from Chandler of 32, 58, 52 and 27 yards.

Day finished with 10 catches for 256 yards.

“Day is a key receiver for us,” said Johncour. “He’s done a good job for us all year. He’s a dependable receiver.”

Avonworth was able to dominate the first half because of its offense and because Fort Cherry was self-destructing, turning the ball over twice on fumbles, including once at the Avonworth one-yard line. Quarterback Devon Brown was sacked five times in that devastating first half and the Rangers were penalized nine times for 50 yards.

In the second half, Fort Cherry dominated and scored the only touchdown when quarterback Devon brown ran it in from the five-yard line.

“I found out something about our team in the second half,” said Shiel. “We have great experience but we’re not the same team that we had three years ago. We ran all kinds of formations with that team, the shotgun, the pistol, multiple formation. We changed formations easily with that team. In the second half, we stuck with one thing and we established an offense drive.”

Interestingly, there were only two possessions in the fourth quarter, Fort Cherry’s completion of a 12-play drive that ended in Brown’s touchdown and Avonworth’s 14-play drive that ended in a missed 27-yard field goal.

“I’m proud of the way we played in the second half,” Shiel said. “This was the closest game Avonworth had this year.”

Brown completed 7 of 15 passes for 142 yards and Scott Miller had three receptions for 102 yards.