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O’Connor leads Rebels past Tigers
Updated: September 17, 2011 12:14AM
The scoreboard showed a comfortable 34-14 Ridgewood victory over bitter rival Elmwood Park on Friday night in Norridge, but the game itself seemed much different.
The main differences were the Tigers having miscues deep in Ridgewood territory while the Rebels had P.J. O’Connor. Elmwood Park fumbled twice near the Rebels’ 20-yard line in the second quarter while O’Connor had a banner night scoring three touchdowns and gaining 320 yards from scrimmage (108 yards on eight rushes and two TDs, 212 yards on 9 catches and one touchdown) in the game.
“We played well tonight on offense,” said O’Connor. Our receivers had no drops, and our quarterback (Joe Jacobsen) played well. It’s a team sport, and I followed my left guard C.J. Norrine and Brad Cabot because they were just opening up holes. Without those guys I wouldn’t have been able to do what I did.”
Elmwood Park (2-2) took its only lead of the game late in the third quarter when Rocco Fanella scored on fourth-and-three from the Ridgewood 10-yard line 14-13 Tigers lead. The drive began on the Ridgewood 47-yard line thanks to a fumble. Fanella was all the offense on that possession for the Tigers. He also scored the other Elmwood Park touchdown in the second quarter from 17 yards out to tie the game at 7-all.
Ridgewood (1-3) would regain the lead 21-14 on the ensuing possession and keep it for good as O’Connor would almost return the favor. After losing 10 yards due to a bad snap on the first play, O’Connor would go 53 yards on a short toss by Jacobsen to bring the ball down to the Elmwood Park 23. After a shovel pass that O’Connor took in for a touchdown was called back for holding, Jacobsen, who completed 17-of-26 passes for 304 yards and three touchdowns, found O’Connor for 17 yards and Eduardo Benitez for 13 to set up first and goal from the Tigers’ six. O’Connor scored on a draw play to re-gain the lead for the Rebels for good as Adam Kutylowski caught a short pass from Jacobsen for the two point conversion.
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