Cranford Football Rolls Past Carteret, 42-14

Dominating, suffocating defense. That’s exactly what Cranford football coach Erik Rosenmeier wanted, and what the Cougars needed if they were to beat visiting Carteret at Memorial Field Friday night. His team responded with an outstanding performance in beating the Ramblers 42-14 in a state playoff consolation game, as the Cougars forced three first half turnovers which proved to be important in victory.

“That was a big part of it,” said Rosenmeier. “We’ve been harping on our defense to go out and make plays and get the offense back on the field, that’s what we asked them to do and they were able to do that three times in the first half. It gave us a short field on three different drives. When you’re able to do that, you’re able to put the game away.”

But this game was more than just the final game of the season. There was motivation for the elder statesmen.

“We definitely needed this for the seniors, to send them home, and also to set the tone for next year,” said junior quarterback Joey Papandrea. “We went out on the right note. We really needed this one.”

Once the defense did their job, the Cougars high-powered offense delivered on their end, posting 28 points by halftime, thanks to a well-executed game plan. In fact, the Cougars have scored on the first drive in every game except Rahway. Papandrea ran for three touchdowns, while Sean Trotter, Tyler Avent (15 rushes, 93 yards) and Chris Witwic rushed for one touchdown each. Overall, the Cougars carried the ball 40 times for 240 yards while passing for another 56 in the air. Placekicker Bobby Gaeta nailed 6 extra points in the rout.

“I thought we played pretty well offensively, a little shaky at first, but Carteret has some good players, especially on defense, where they disrupted us a little bit,” said Rosenmeier. “Papandrea ran the offense well, we got big plays by Tyrone Avent again, we were able to spread the ball around to Kendall Greer and Sean Trotter. We threw it down the field on a couple of occasions. Up front, they did a pretty good job. We were able to spread the ball around.”

On defense, the credit was spread around evenly. Kasim Lewis led the way with six tackles, Will Green had five, Avent and Trotter had four each, J.P. Christiano tallied three, and Papandrea had two stops.

Meanwhile, the Cougars' offense has been on fire the past two games posting a whopping 91 points. But there’s no doubt the offense knows where their bread is buttered. It’s with the guys chasing the other team’s quarterback.

“We came out defensively thinking we had to put a full game together, forcing turnovers, the fumble and the pick early in the game," said Papandrea. “We capitalized on offense when they gave us the short field.”

“Well, we got a young offense, most of us are coming back," said junior Sean Trotter. “So we’ll keep practicing, working hard and get some wins next year.”

The Cougars struggled at the beginning of the year, starting 1-5, while losing three of those games by less than a touchdown. Since then, they’ve won three of four, closing out the season with a flourish, finishing 4-6 overall.

“It’s tough the way we started, but we came together at the end, we kept fighting and we never quit," said Papandrea. “It’s a great way to head into next year and a great way to send the seniors out.”