Homecoming Victory for Garden City Football

Garden City traditions run very deep, and the excitement of Homecoming is one of the events that the town embraces. There are good crowds for all the day’s activities starting with the morning games and leading to the Seventh Street promenade and parade route, and ultimately to the afternoon football game and halftime show.

This year’s game was a match against Valley Stream Central, a team that the Trojans do not have a long history with. The Eagles came into the game with a 2-2 record, although they were coming off a 29-0 loss to New Hyde Park last week.

The Trojans had won their first four games by a combined score of 166-14, surrendering only two 4th quarter touchdowns after the games were well in hand. Dave Ettinger and his coaching staff have their team well prepared each week, exemplified by the team averaging 30 points in the first half while giving up none.

The game against Central was no different, although it took the Trojan offense a few series to get into the flow of the game. The opening drive for the Trojans ended with a field goal attempt hitting the crossbar. The Eagles offense, fired up by the strong defensive stand, produced several good gains by running back Joshua Rogers. But on third and long senior captain Brendan Staub burst through the line and took down Mohammed Daffalia for a loss.

The Trojans wasted little time as senior captain Luke Schmitt dropped back to throw and hit another senior, Michael Fargione down the left sideline. Having gotten behind the defender, Fargione only had the safety to beat down the sideline and did so with a good stiff arm at about the ten. The result was a 57-yard pass and catch for a 7-0 score.

The touchdown brought the crowd to its feet and appeared to kickstart the Trojans because they never looked back. The second quarter saw GC put Central on their heels on both offense and defense as they outscored the Eagles 21-0 to go into halftime up 28-0.

There was a 46 yard touchdown for Senior captain Jack Cascadden on a sweep that saw him get a key block from Jackson Parisa to spring him down the field. After a quick three and out the Trojans had a more methodical drive for a six-yard touchdown pass to Will Peters from Schmitt. The big play on that drive was a short pass from the 41-yard line to Perisa, who took it to the six. The final score of the first half was produced by the arm of Schmitt. First, he hit Aiden Considine for a long gainer to the eleven-yard line. From there, it was a quick slant into the end zone by Jackson Parisa for a touchdown. On the day Schmitt completed nine of ten throws for 169 yards and three touchdowns.

Although Centrals quarterback Quran Watkins looked dangerous in the pocket, his strong arm continuously overshot his receivers as he had to release the ball quickly because of the fierce Trojan rush.

Garden City received the second half kickoff and didn’t wait long to add to the lopsided score. Cascadden took the first down pitch and without being touched scampered down the left sideline for a 64-yard touchdown run only 19 seconds into the third quarter. Cascadden ended his day with 158 yards for two touchdowns on ten carries.

The next Garden City scoring drive ate up about five minutes of the quarter and produced a five yard touchdown run for Stevie Finnell. On the day the junior running back ran for 67 yards and seven carries.

Closing out the game in the fourth quarter was backup senior quarterback Ryan Maher, who led a long drive culminated by a one yard touchdown run for senior fullback Evan Katradis. The final drive was keyed by some fine runs from senior back Francesco Ingrassia and junior Matt Mehling.

The Trojans travel to 4-1 Mepham next Saturday looking to keep their fine season going.