St. Anthony's wins 25th straight, 21-13
St. Anthony's RB Anthony Anderson reacts after scoring a touchdown in the second quarter against Chaminade in the CHSFL high school Division AAA football game. (Oct. 21, 2011) Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
Chaminade was looking to make a point against perennial CHSFL powerhouse St. Anthony's. Actually, the Flyers were looking to make two points.
Visiting Chaminade had just scored to cut its deficit to one with 3:06 left, and coach Stephen Boyd decided not to go for the tie. "We came here to win the game,'' said Boyd, a former NFL All-Pro linebacker from Valley Stream. "I had confidence in my kids.''
Quarterback Joe Anile, who had just scored on a 25-yard run, kept the ball on the conversion play and angled for the left pylon. But St. Anthony's linebacker Dylan Cafarella ran him down from behind inside the 2, preserving the lead.
On the Friars' next possession, Dariyan Riley popped through the line of scrimmage for a 68-yard jaunt. That set up his 2-yard TD run that clinched St. Anthony's 21-13 win before an overflow crowd of almost 4,000 fans on homecoming night.
"A lot was going through my mind,'' Cafarella said after his team (6-0, 6-0 CHSFL) extended its winning streak to 25. "The big crowd. But mainly, it was just to stop them. We had to stop them. I saw he was going outside and I tried to fight through to catch him [from behind]. Then I got a lot of help from my teammates. I was thinking, 'Just don't let go.' ''
Chaminade (5-2, 4-2) pushed St. Anthony's to the limit with an opportunistic defense that forced four turnovers. Three of them came in the first half on poor exchanges, prompting St. Anthony's to replace senior quarterback Pete Carew with sophomore Greg Galligan.
"We were stopping ourselves. We weren't going anywhere,'' Friars coach Rich Reichert said. "Greg is a soph, but he's a good player.''
Galligan's 32-yard run set up Riley's 1-yard TD run with 48 seconds left in the third quarter that gave St. Anthony's a 14-7 lead. At 14-13, Chaminade still had 3:06 to retake the lead. But after an onside kick failed, Riley (140 yards and two TDs on 16 carries) came through.
"It's a play I was begging the coaches to run all night,'' Riley said of the quick-hitter. "The first time, it didn't work too well. The next time, it worked like it was supposed to.''
