Barnegat Breaks Through With 16-14 Victory Over Central

When you’ve lost a couple of games, it can become a real challenge to maintain the belief that you can win.

After their 16-14 victory over Central Regional in Bayville on Friday night, on a pair of touchdown passes by Mark McCoy and Pat Moran’s 32-yard field goal, the Barnegat Bengals are believing in themselves again.

“How do you get rid of the taste of losing? You win the game!” Barnegat head coach Rob Davis told the players after the hard-fought victory, in which they had to come back from a 14-7 deficit. “Now we go on a run.”

It was a challenging night for both teams, as rain fell steadily in the first half, making the ball – and the field – slippery. While Barnegat (1-2, 1-1 in Shore Conference Class B South) has had a balanced offensive attack, on Friday night it was forced to lean on its running backs, David Smithman and Matt Schofield, and on McCoy when the weather cooperated, to get the job done.

“We overcame a lot tonight,” Davis said.

Barnegat showed it meant business from the start. After forcing Central to go three-and-out on its first possession, the Bengals took possession at their own 42 after a good punt return by Moran and moved efficiently downfield, with McCoy completing the 58-yard drive with an 8-yard touchdown pass to Jordan Salt to take a 7-0 lead. McCoy completed eight of 14 passes for 140 yards.

But the rain began to pick up, and Barnegat got itself into trouble. After recovering the ball when Central fumbled the ensuing kickoff, Barnegat returned the favor, one of five times the Bengals fumbled on Friday.

That seemed to get the Golden Eagles focused, and they put together a seven-play, 72-yard drive that featured two long runs by Kalyph Hardy before he ran in for the final two yards and the score that tied the game at 7.

It was one of the few times Hardy was able to break free, however, as the Bengals kept the senior in check most of the game, stopping him cold inside and preventing him from breaking loose on the toss sweeps that had been so effective in Central’s first two games. Hardy finished with 120 yards on the ground, much of that tally on three long runs.

The Bengals fumbled again in the second quarter, one of five fumbles they had, setting Central up at the Barnegat 16. This time it was Central who switched things up. After a holding penalty on a Hardy run pushed the Golden Eagles back to the 26, they took to the air as Mike Grieco found Joshua Dwight all alone in the end zone for a 26-yard touchdown that gave Central a 14-7 lead going into halftime.

By the time the teams emerged from the lockerroom, the rain had stopped, and Barnegat began to throw its muscle around. The Bengals put the ball in the hands of Schofield, their fullback, after Smithman went out with a thumb injury, and Schofield gave Central fits. The Barnegat offensive line began opening huge holes for him to run through, and when the holes weren’t as big, Schofield, who rushed for 52 yards in the second half, plowed his way through anyway.

“It was gut-check time,” Davis said. “We challenged the boys to come back and win the game.”

“I’ve been telling them all year I could run the ball,” said Schofield, who converted to fullback from lineman after last year. “I just saw green. My offensive line was awesome tonight.”

Barnegat wasted some of that effort, however, with ill-timed holding penalties. And while the Bengals drove inside Central’s 20-yard line four times, they weren’t able to get into the end zone as Central tightly covered the Bengals’ receivers and sacked McCoy, forcing the Bengals to punt.

Barnegat drew within a point, 14-13, when McCoy hit Pat Moran on a slant and Moran was able to escape a couple of defenders for a 47-yard touchdown. But Central got a couple of players through and they partially blocked the extra point.

Central, however, set Barnegat up nicely when the Golden Eagles fumbled a snap and Barnegat recovered at the Central 27. While Central didn’t allow the Bengals to convert the touchdown, Moran was able to kick a 32-yard field goal with 8:03 to go to give Barnegat the lead.

From there, the Barnegat defense contained Central’s every offensive effort. McCoy was seemingly all over the place, sacking Grieco on one play and intercepting a Grieco pass to end the game.

Barnegat has a week off, with no game scheduled next weekend, giving them two weeks to prepare for the tough challenge presented by Lacey at Lacey on Oct. 8.

“Enjoy this win, boys,” Davis said. “Let’s build on this.”