Nov 7, 2025 4 min read

By John Sacco

For the Observer-Reporter

newsroom@observer-reporter.com

Geneva College football coach Geno DeMarco seems to have saved his best for last.

Washington & Jefferson, which needs a victory to clinch a second consecutive Presidents’ Athletic Conference championship and be the automatic qualifier from the league to the NCAA Division III playoffs, is wary of the new-look Golden Tornadoes.

Geneva (5-1 in PAC, 5-3 overall) hosts the Presidents (6-0, 6-2) Saturday at Reeves Stadium in Beaver Falls. Kickoff is 1 p.m.

The Golden Tornadoes – long a triple-option team offensively – features a wide-open, pass-happy attack. They are led by quarterback Caleb Romano (6-3, 195), a junior who has thrown for 2,941 yards with 29 TDs and 12 interceptions. Geneva has scored 326 points (40.75 per game). The Golden Tornadoes average 78.4 rushing yards per game.

“They have four really good receivers and the quarterback is very accurate and they run a lot of different things,” said Presidents coach Mike Sirianni, who notched his 200th career victory last week in W&J’s crucial 28-17win over Case Western Reserve.

“They are really hard to prepare for and they do some things we haven’t seen. Their season is very similar to ours. I mean you could look at their first game (a 44-18 loss to Widener), which was probably the worst game they played.”

Geneva also lost to Shenandoah (29-28) and Grove City (22-9). They have scored 28 or more points in six games and 51 points or more in half of its games.

The Golden Tornadoes can win the PAC with two victories to end the season and would need Case Western to defeat Grove City this weekend.

Add that to the fact this will be DeMarco’s last home game as he is retiring after 33 years at the helm.

“They have really good players,” Sirianni said. “They look the part in their uniforms and they’re playing with a lot of confidence. This is a big game. I’ve known they haven’t been in a game like this.

“They’re going to be playing with a lot of emotion. We expect a tough game. We’re treating this like a championship game. Our guys have been in playoff mode for six weeks. They know and we know that they can beat us if we don’t play to our standards. We know this is going to be a close game and we are preparing like we’re playing the No. 1 team in the country.”

DeMarco is discounting and dismissing the hype and any championship game talk.

“We feel pretty good going into this game just because it’s the game we play this week,” DeMarco said. “We really haven’t talked about all the extra emotion and all the other hoopla that goes with this game. We have enough to worry about trying to play one of the best teams in the country.

“I think they’re a complete football team. I mean one of the things you do when you look at teams is to find weaknesses. It’s really difficult to find any weakness.”

W&J’s defense, after a rough two-game start, has come on in PAC play to allow only 61 points – much of that with the game in hand — over the past six contests.

Two of that unit’s stalwarts, end Antoine Smith and defensive back Angelo Volomino, said Geneva will challenge across the field.

“I think they bring a big test for us because our coaching staff is telling us this is the best quarterback that we’ve seen since Utica,” Volomino said. “We’ve faced some good quarterbacks and a lot of these teams are passing more now in the PAC, especially this year. Since those first two weeks, our secondary, our defense in general, has built confidence. I think we’ve hit our stride. But we know what they want to do. They used to be triple option and now it might get sprinkled in.

“But they’ve been throwing the ball 50 times a game. For sure, we’re going to get tested.”

Smith said harassing opposing quarterbacks and causing turnovers is key.

“Some of the challenges include keeping the quarterback contained and not giving them as much time to throw because he has a lot of threats on the outside,” Smith said. “Part of our job is to make their offensive linemen move their feet. Most of our challenge is just keeping the QB on his toes so he won’t have chances to make those good throws that he’s been making against other teams.”