Week Six 9/30/22

Panthers Continue to Improve

By: Julia Henry

The Quakertown High School Panther football team lost a league game against the Souderton Indians last Friday night, final score 34-20. Souderton built an early lead, going up 14-0 in the first quarter, but Quakertown was able to stay in the game and recover in the second half.

Quakertown scored their first points towards the end of the second quarter, a touchdown and a missed extra point, making the score 20-6. Vince Micucci, junior quarterback, completed a 37-yard pass to fellow junior wide receiver Max Morris for the touchdown. “Souderton’s defense was pretty solid…eventually, settling into the game helped me read the defense and give the plays time to develop,” commented Micucci on how he was able to read Souderton’s defense to move the Quakertown offense down field each drive. On the defensive side of the game, junior running back and inside linebacker Cody Jefferson spoke on how the Panther defense read Souderton’s offense, “inside linebacker Gavin Carroll and I focused on reading the guards…if they would pull, block down, or pass block.” This helped the Panthers, “follow through” with their defensive assignments, “in order to win the game,” Jefferson added.

Down 24-6 to begin the second half, the Panthers knew they needed the momentum on their side to execute a comeback. The defense, “had some mistakes in the first half, but in the second half we came out strong as a defensive core and played well,” said Jefferson on how his defensive approach shifted throughout the game. Towards the end of the third quarter, the Panthers scored on a 21-yard pass from Micucci to senior running back John Eatherton and successfully converted a 2-point attempt. The 2-point conversion was well executed by the Panthers as Micucci threw the football to Eatherton and immediately ran to the left towards the end zone before Eatherton threw it back to a wide-open Micucci. Micucci commented that the “2-point conversion was a play design that we just installed,” noting that, “a play like that only works one time, so when we converted it I was really happy”. The drive, resulting in 8-points, allowed the Panthers to reduce Souderton’s lead to 10 points and gave the Panthers momentum.

Micucci spoke about a takeaway from the game being that, “we are able to compete and stay competitive with any team.” Momentum and energy also seem to be an important key to next week’s game as Jefferson spoke on, “hav[ing] the same energy on and off the field as we did against CR South. We need to study film hard and have a good week of practice.”

The Quakertown Panthers (2-4) face the Bensalem Fighting Owls (2-4) at the Bensalem High School Memorial Stadium on Friday, October 7, a league game. Bensalem lost to their Week Five opponent, the Harry S. Truman Tigers, final score 8-7. The Panthers look to attack early to beat the Owls.