Fired-up Charleroi dominates behind Pellegrini’s passing, running
CHARLEROI – Where there is smoke there is fire.
When the Charleroi High School football team chose a different entrance to the field Friday night – lining behind the end zone, near firetrucks, and running through a haze caused by a smoke machine – it quickly ignited a spark that visiting Washington couldn’t extinguish.
Charleroi quickly went from smoke to sparks to a five-alarm fire, scoring three touchdowns and recording a safety in the first quarter to take lead and never looked back, defeating Washington, 64-33, in an Interstate Conference game.
The loss for the Prexies snapped a 39-game regular-season winning streak that dated back to 2013. It was also the first time the Cougars defeated Washington since 2008.
“Wash High has had everybody’s number for a long time,” said Charleroi coach Lance Getsy, who was making his debut with the Cougars.
“They are the defending conference champions and defending WPIAL champions. It doesn’t get any better than this.”
The Cougars scored the first 16 points of the game in a matter of only 22 seconds. Quarterback Geno Pellegrini faked a handoff and raced for a 64-yard touchdown on Charleroi’s opening play from scrimmage. Hunter Perry sacked Washington quarterback Zack Swartz one yard deep in the end zone eight seconds later. On the third play after the Prexies’ free kick, Pellegrini found Legend Davis for a 45-yard touchdown to take a 16-0 lead with 9:15 left in the first quarter.
By Luke Campbell
Staff writer
lcampbell@observer-reporter.com
“It gave our kids the confidence, but we game planned really well,” Getsy said. “We knew where the openings were going to be and took advantage of them. We were able to stick to our game plan and the kids executed.”
Washington (0-1, 1-1) didn’t begin executing on offense until it was down by more than three touchdowns nearly halfway through the opening quarter. Pellegrini threw his second of five touchdowns – an 18-yard strike to Perry – to lead 23-0.
The Prexies scored their first points when Swartz capped a seven-play, 74-yard drive with a 24-yard touchdown run. The closest Washington would get was when it scored on its next possession, another Swartz run of three yards, to cut the deficit to 23-13 with 6:47 left in the second quarter.
“It showed how much work we have to do,” said Washington coach Mike Bosnic. “There are so many things we need to work on. We fell behind early but still made a lot of plays. We missed some plays, too. Charleroi did a real nice job.”
The dominance from the Cougars, who took a 30-13 lead into halftime, continued into the third and fourth quarters.
Holly Tonini/Observer-Reporter
Pellegrini threw touchdown passes of 10, 38 and 19 yards to Dakota Romantino as Charleroi (1-0, 1-0) scored more points than Washington’s first eight opponents combined to score last season.
“We had a lot of mistakes tonight, a lot of missed tackles and a lot of over-running plays,” Bosnic said. “But we have an inexperienced team and missed the first week of camp and first scrimmage. We overcame a lot last week and this week it caught up to us.”
Foot, hand and mouth disease ran rampant through the Washington roster at the start of the season causing the Prexies to miss valuable practice time.
The Prexies’ defense, which dominated the line of scrimmage and stifled Pellegrini last season, had no answer for the senior quarterback. He completed 11 of 17 passes for 212 yards and the five touchdowns. Pellegrini also carried the ball 14 times for 153 yards and two more scores.
Charleroi junior running back Brayden Mihalcin had 168 yards and two touchdowns on 22 carries.
Swartz threw for 260 yards and had five touchdowns.
“Charleroi made it hard for us to run the ball,” Bosnic said. “They contained us. They did a real nice job. We are going to get better. I have confidence in our coaches and in our kids.”