Mater Dei Destroy's St. Anthony's, But Just How Good Are The Seraphs

Above Photos: coin toss, captains, running back Sincere Saunders and the Mater Dei defense

MIDDLETOWN TOWNSHIP – After Saturday’s 51-8 blow-out win over seventh-seed St. Anthony’s of Jersey City in a NJSIAA Non-Public Group II opening-round game the question dogging the top-seeded Seraphs all-season long still remained unanswered.

Just how good is Mater Dei? That’s the question people have been asking all season long. Are they overrated or are they underrated? But after destroying an obviously outmanned St. Anthony’s squad Saturday, that topic is still up for debate.

Grant it, Mater Die (10-0) is ranked tenth in the Shore Conference, but the knock against the Seraphs all season long has been the level of competition that’s been put in front of them. But really, what are they supposed to do? Saturday’s contest marked the fifth game in row where the Seraphs used second and third string players for the entire second half.

It’s a catch 22. You take your starters out; they lose valuable time on the field. You keep them in; you’re criticized for running up the score. They’ve been unfairly immersed in a no-win situation that thankfully for them should be settled next weekend.

South Jersey power and No. 3 seed St. Joseph (Hammonton) (7-3) - a 48-0 winner over No. 6 seed Holy Cross Saturday - will be traveling to Mater Dei next Saturday for the Non-Public Group II semifinals.

“We can only control what we do, so that’s what we tell the boys,” Mater Dei head coach Dino Mangiero said after the game. “But this is five or six games in a row now that our starters haven’t played in the second half. That’s a real concern; we’ve got a real football team coming in here next week. They’ve faced some adversity and have been through the fire and we haven’t. You learn a great deal from adversity and there are great lessons from losing but you can’t say unfortunately you haven’t had that opportunity because you want to win.

“We’ll see next week, won’t we.” said Mangiero when asked how good his team is. “Next week really tells the story. I think they’re a good team and if we can find a way to beat them then I think we’ll feel a lot better about ourselves. We’ve got a lot of good football players on this team, so we’ll see.”

St. Anthony’s came into Saturday’s game with six wins this season so this was no cupcake the Seraphs ate up. Mater Dei is just that much better.

The Seraphs didn’t waste any time getting on the scoreboard as sophomore running back Sincere Saunders broke a 50-yard run on the first play from scrimmage down to the 10-yard line. Two plays later junior quarterback George Pearson Jr. went untouched up the middle from 10-yards out for a 7-0 lead just a minute into the game.

St. Anthony’s then went for it on fourth-and-1 from their own 39 on their first possession of the game but sophomore Izaiah Henderson dumped running back Kahlil Vance for a 4-yard loss. Four plays later Saunders ran around left end from the 18 diving into the end zone for the final two yards for the score. With Roan Maxwell’s extra point the score was 14-0 less than six minutes into the game.

On St. Anthony’s next possession, a high snap over the head of quarterback Nashawn Taylor lost a whopping 30 yards putting the ball on the 1-yard line before senior defensive end and captain Shane Mastro blocked the Friars ensuing punt out of the end zone for a safety making it 16-0.

Mater Dei was handed excellent field possession after the Friars kickoff from the 20 and three plays later Pearson found Eddie Lewis open over the middle and Lewis broke right before racing down the sidelines and diving for the pylon for the score and a 23-0 lead after the extra point.

Two plays into the second quarter senior running back Justin McCrae burst up the gut of the St. Anthony defense for a five yard touchdown that was set up by a 38-yard run down to the 5-yard line by Marvin Pierre. The defense then got back into the act when defensive lineman Mario Rodriguez picked off an attempted screen pass then rumbling 22 yards for the score and a 37-0 lead with 9:58 still left in the first half.

Saunders got back into the act taking a handoff up the middle and running virtually untouched 23 yards for a score pushing the lead to 44-0 at the half. Saunders rushed for 122 yards on just six carries and two touchdowns in one half of work.

“From last year it’s just another whole environment and I just love it,” said Saunders about this year’s team. “This team is awesome. Everybody does there job; there’s nothing like it. We take it week-by-week and get better-and-better. We’re going to approach next week the same as any game.”

“We’ve been working with him all year,” Mangiero said of Saunders. “He’s really starting to pick it up. You can see today, he’s really seeing the holes now and hitting them.”

The Mater Dei defense was intense and focused. They swarmed from all angles of the field and had St. Anthony’s offense reeling to the point where the Friars offense might’ve well have just laid down.

St. Anthony was held to minus 40 yards – yes, that’s correct - and just one first down in the first half as the Seraphs defense once again demonstrated just how good of a unit this group is.

Mastro led the defensive charge knocking down a pass and blocking a punt along with a sack and a TFL but the whole unit; including senior linebacker Juwan Mitchell (6 T, 2 TFL), Lewis (sack), Henderson (4T, TFL) and linebackers Shitta Sillah (sack, TFL) and Jonathan Lubintus (TFL), just to name a few was phenomenal.

“We have five or six kids that are going to be playing at a high level of college so you’ve got D-I football players out there,” Mangiero said. We have an aggressive style of defense and there’s no secret in that now after 10 games, so when you put that talent and aggressiveness together, they get it going some time.”

It’s an intriguing story line that will finally be answered one way or another next week against St. Joe’s.

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