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KINGSTON — On Senior Night, underneath the lights on Friday night for the first time in at least six or seven years, the Wyoming Seminary fans had Nesbitt Memorial Stadium rocking and the players amped up.
Blair Academy, a longtime rival of Sem’s, decided to crash the party.
The Buccaneers defense held Seminary scoreless through the final three quarters and capitalized on a pair of turnovers to beat Sem 21-7 on Friday.
The Blue Knights led 7-6 through the first quarter, but two costly giveaways in the second quarter turned into 15 Blair Academy points — all the Bucs would need to pick up the win.
“Two weeks ago when we had our Homecoming win, we didn’t turn the ball over, we limited our penalties,” said Seminary coach Kevin Burke. “This week was the opposite.”
On the game’s opening drive, the Seminary offense marched down the field with ease, driving 70 yards in less than three minutes. The drive was capped off by a 20-yard touchdown from Malichi Greaves, putting Sem up by a touchdown at the 9:20 mark in the first quarter.
The Blue Knights wouldn’t score another point the rest of the way as Blair’s defense settled in and began to cause havoc with its consistent pressure of Sem quarterback Mike McMaugh.
“Their interior pressure was getting to us, and we were struggling to pick it up,” Burke said. “And we just didn’t execute, we had open receivers and missed them, missed a few reads … we couldn’t get going again.”
Blair turned around and scored on its opening drive, with Micah Balzarini finding Kaleb Nelson in the corner of the end zone for the touchdown. A blocked extra point kept Sem ahead by a point heading into the second quarter.
There, disaster struck. A long gain on a pass to wideout Justin Denson ended in a fumble recovered by Blair. The Bucs took the ball downfield and scored on a 10-yard run from Yaneik Gallego to take the lead, with a successful two-point conversion making up for the missed extra point.
On Sem’s next possession, a pass from McMaugh was read and snagged by linebacker Brayden Phinney, whose return set up Blair in the red zone.
Another connection from Balzarini to Nelson, and just like that Blair’s lead was 21-7 with just 21 seconds left before the half.
The sudden swing gave Blair the edge on the scoreboard in a game that was played very evenly for much of the night.
The Seminary defense dug in their heels and shut down Blair the rest of the way, forcing a few punts and a few fourth-down stops to keep the Blue Knights alive.
“Defense has been our backbone all year, that’s our bread and butter,” Burke said. “We made a little bit of an adjustment.”
The loss drops Sem to 3-3, with two road games against Hun School and Trinity-Pawling left to go.
Blair Academy 21, Wyoming Seminary 7
Blair Academy`6`15`0`0 — 21
Wyo. Seminary`7`0`0`0 — 7
First quarter
SEM — Malichi Greaves 20 run (Gio Gallo kick) 9:20
BLA — Kaleb Nelson 15 pass from Micah Balzarini (kick failed) 6:45
Second quarter
BLA — Yaneik Gallego 10 run (Nelson pass from Balzarini) 4:43
BLA — Nelson 17 pass from Balzarini (Jackson Armbruster kick) 0:21
Team statistics`BLA`SEM
First downs`14`14
Rushes-yards`26-164`30-189
Passing yards`140`92
Total yards`304`281
Passing`13-17-0`7-17-1
Sacked-yards lost`0-0`3-14
Punts-avg.`3-35.6`3-35
Fumbles-lost`0-0`1-1
Penalties-yards`8-95`6-40
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
RUSHING — BLA, Gallego 17-136, Noah Abbott 9-28. SEM, Greaves 10-58, Nico Andrews 8-73, Alex Roman 8-69, Michael McMaugh 2-(minus-11), Andrew Brobbey 2-0.
PASSING — BLA, Balzarini 13-17-140-0. SEM, McMaugh 6-15-63-1, Andrews 1-2-29-0.
RECEIVING — BLA, Lucas Dale 1-29, Nelson 3-39, Brayden Phinney 2-0, Armbruster 3-25, Mayan Muchugia 1-16, Carson Bowman 3-31. SEM, Justin Denson 5-67, Brobbey 1-13, Gavin Green 1-12.
INTERCEPTIONS — BLA, Phinney 1-22. SEM, none.
MISSED FGs — BLA, Armbruster 1-44. SEM, none.