Neshannock controls clock, stops Mohawk to win MAC championship

By: James Dotson
Saturday, October 28, 2023 | 12:24 AM

The best way to stop a high-powered offense is to keep it off the field.

The Neshannock offensive line took that to heart Friday night. The Lancers offense ran twice as many plays as Mohawk did, mainly working the rushing attack, in a 13-7 victory at Bob Bleggi Stadium.

The win gives Neshannock (9-1, 7-0) its ninth conference championship in program history. Both the Lancers and Mohawk (8-2, 6-1) came into the night unblemished in conference play.

Neshannock outgained Mohawk 320-126 and held the Warriors to 0 for 6 on third downs.

“Our offensive line is built for that,” Neshannock coach Fred Mozzocio said of his team’s control of the game. “We felt like we could pound the rock. Our guys were excited about it. We felt that we could control the line of scrimmage, and we did on both sides.”

On the first play from scrimmage, Mohawk senior quarterback Jay Wrona found Dante Retort on a 44-yard bomb to immediately put the pressure on the Lancers defense.

After converting a fourth down later in the drive, the Warriors went to their bag of tricks. They ran a reverse pass, but Bobby Fadden’s throw into the end zone was picked off by Carter DeVivo.

“We take chances. There’s no doubt,” Mohawk coach Tim McCutcheon said. “When you call those plays and they work, it’s the greatest call in the world. And when they don’t, that’s how it goes. Obviously it didn’t work out. Maybe it was a poor decision at the end of it. That’s our call as coaches, and we did not execute.”

After Mohawk’s next drive fizzled out, a Blake Logan punt pinned the Lancers at their own 2-yard line. Neshannock responded with a 15-play, 98-yard touchdown drive that took over eight minutes. All 15 plays were rushing attempts. Jino Mozzocio capped the long drive with a 27-yard keeper to give Neshannock a 7-0 lead midway through the second quarter.

Mohawk answered with a long kick return from Retort down to the Lancers 37-yard line. After again converting on a fourth down, Fadden took a misdirection end around and walked in untouched for a 1-yard score to tie the game 7-7 just before the half.

“There’s a lot of nerves coming on the road into this environment with (the conference title) on the line,” McCutcheon said. “At halftime, we felt pretty good with where we were at. We felt like we just needed to get rid of some of the mistakes and be a little more disciplined.”

Neshannock was able to make its key adjustments in the locker room, while Mohawk’s team elected to stay on the field instead of walking back to the high school during intermission.

“We talked about having eye discipline and keying the receiver that you’re supposed to key,” Mozzocio said. “Coach (Bongivengo) did a great job of just calming everyone in the secondary, making sure that they had eye discipline.”

That calm demeanor led to a Lancers defense that held Mohawk to just five yards of offense in the second half and forced two interceptions from Wrona.

“We felt that if we put pressure on (Wrona), he would put a couple in our hands defensively,” Mozzocio said.

On both interceptions, one late in the third quarter and one early in the fourth, Neshannock dropped and rushed only three defenders. The defensive line still was able to flush Wrona out of the pocket, leading to the interceptions by Braden Montgomery and Anthony Bonner.

“Dropping that extra man into coverage was huge for us,” Mozzocio said. “You got a great quarterback back there with great receivers. We tried to give him different looks to confuse him at times, and we were able to get some heat when we didn’t blitz.”

The interceptions led to short fields, one capped off with another Jino Mozzocio touchdown run, this from 17 yards out on the first play of the fourth quarter.

The sophomore quarterback finished with 90 rushing and 108 passing yards and the only two touchdowns for Neshannock.

“First and foremost with Jino, he’s as fierce a competitor as you’ll ever find,” Coach Mozzocio said. “He continued to grind and work on his craft all year to make sure he just wasn’t a one-dimensional guy. We knew we couldn’t … run the table (without him being) effective through the air and on the ground. He’s just gotten better week by week.”

Mohawk’s defense was able to weather the storm and get the offense back on the field with 9:29 remaining, trailing 13-7. The Warriors picked up their only first down of the second half but had to punt the ball away.

“Our defense was on the field quite a bit tonight,” McCutcheon said, “but they were able to get us the ball back with about (nine) minutes left and only down six. At that point, we felt good with where we were, but we were unable to execute.”

Neshannock then turned to the ground game again and milked the final 7:09 off of the clock without giving the ball back to the opposition, courtesy of a 13-play drive that featured five first downs, a fourth-down conversion and a key offside penalty.

“When two good football teams get together for an important game like that, the little things matter,” McCutcheon said. “We had a couple of significant offsides penalties, a couple of turnovers and maybe two assignments where we weren’t lined up properly. Those things in a game like this make a difference, and they did.”

Neshannock is now 30-4 against Lawrence County opponents in coach Mozzocio’s 12 years with the Lancers.

“It’s hard to go through the MAC conference undefeated,” McCutcheon said. “For this to come down to two undefeated teams for the championship … that certainly made for a perfect setting.”

“This one is going to hurt tonight and tomorrow, but they’ve put themselves in a great spot,” McCutcheon continued. “They’re allowed to feel sorry for themselves a bit over tonight and tomorrow. But after that, we wash the dirt off and get ready because we get to come back home for a playoff game, and that’s a big deal.”

Neshannock now looks ahead to a likely top two seed in the WPIAL Class 2A tournament as the Midwestern Athletic Conference champion and a first-round bye along with it. Coach Mozzocio wants to see more when the brackets are unveiled Saturday afternoon.

“We’re honored to be the representative coming out of the MAC,” Mozzocio said after the game. “We believe that we’ve earned the No. 1 spot in the WPIAL playoffs. We’re the only team in the WPIAL 2A that has not lost to a WPIAL opponent. We lost to a 3A Sharon team, which was Week Zero and like a scrimmage for us, and we’ve run the table, so we deserve the No. 1 seed.”

Tags: Mohawk, Neshannock