Saturday, September 22, 2007

By Jim McConville
NJS.com Staff Writer

Three runs by fullback Bryan Remmen put the ball at the 9 and set up Ridgewood's game-winning football.

RIDGEWOOD -- Doug Christopher has been to the well before. With 9 successful field goals in 11 chances in his career, Christopher knows full well the value of the three-pointer. Friday afternoon, the senior took another step forward with his first game-winning attempt.

The boot from 26 yards out was straight and true and would have been good from 40 yards. It lifted Ridgewood to a 3-0 win over Hackensack in a typical game between the two teams, but one that certainly sends them in opposite directions.

The Maroons raised their record to 3-0 with the key victory in the NNJIL Division A race. Hackensack, on the other hand, fell to 0-2 and must now consider its league and playoff hopes secondary to simply getting a win.

“How many great games have we had with this team,” Ridgewood head coach Chuck Johnson remarked. “Every year on Monday of the Hackensack week, I go through the past games, because I want them to appreciate the history and all the great plays that both sides have made.”

Michael Cerbo had 71 yards on 21 carries for Hackensack.

Seemingly headed for overtime, the Maroons took possession off a short punt at their own 46-yard line with 2:46 on the clock. A third down conversion and a pair of pass interference penalties on the Comets put the ball at the Hackensack 16 with 59 seconds remaining.

Three runs by fullback Bryan Remmen put the ball at the 9, where Ridgewood called time out with 8 seconds to go and brought Christopher out.

“I tried not to think about it. I just tried to think about practice,” Christopher related. “Try to vision it, get my footsteps, keep my head down. During scrimmages I my head was coming up and I was missing them.”

“He’s had a lot of big, clutch field goals, and I’m very comfortable with him,” Johnson said. “He is a very poised kid.”

Everything went perfectly, putting the only points on the board with 4.2 ticks showing. The squib kickoff left the Comets little opportunity, and the Maroons gladly escaped with their fourth straight win over the Comets.

“Trust in my center (Remmen) and holder (Bob Barthold) really helped a lot,” Christopher said. “I just had to do my job, I knew they would do theirs.”

A similar situation was in front of the Maroons at the end of the first half, as Ridgewood was facing a fourth and a long one at the Comet 6-yard line with 40 seconds left. This time, Johnson went for the six points and came up empty when quarterback Greg Johnson was dropped by Justis Oliver for a three-yard loss on a bootleg left.

Greg Johnson and RIdgewood improved to 3-0 on the season.

“I’d look like a real horse’s (butt) at the end of the half when we didn’t kick the field goal if we don’t win this,” Johnson said. “We were pounding them, they were lying on the ground, I thought we had them and, honestly, I got greedy. I apologized to the kids at halftime. I should have kicked the field goal.”

“Going into the half with a touchdown would have been a lot better,” Christopher said.

“Greg’s got a little extra speed this year, and I just felt like it was a little bit (too long) for a fullback belly,” Johnson explained.

Hackensack’s general inability to sustain any offense may also have played into his decision. The Comets were coming off a bye week after their upset loss to Paramus in their opener, and they had made some changes, notably the reinsertion of sophomore Rafyel Hammond at quarterback.

“They’re a good defensive team, we just couldn’t get anything going,” Hackensack head coach Scooter Whiting said. “I thought (Hammond) would give us a spark, I though it would.”

Instead, the Maroon defense shut off the run effectively, limiting the Comets to just 131 ground yards and 124 total yards in the game while recording a second straight shutout.

Sophomore Rafyel Hammond throwing one of the two passes that Hackensack called on Friday.

“I knew before the season we’d be pretty good on defense, but we have to get something going offensively, get a system going.”

While the running game was being stifled, Hackensack did not look to pass, throwing only two times all game, with one of them being intercepted by Nick Rispoli.

“We wanted to throw the ball, but (the game) was so tight, we didn’t want to make a mistake,” Whiting commented.

Michael Cerbo had 71 yards on 21 carries for Hackensack, and Mike Reiter topped the defense with 11 tackles. Ausar Walcott and Nicholas Hayes each had nine stops.

Sam Nuber (12 carries, 55 yards) and Remmen (14-52) were the rushing leaders for the Maroons, who got only a 7-yard completion to Nuber on the first offensive play out of the passing game. Fabio Palacio had nine of his 10 tackles in the second half.

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