High school football: Spark play does job as Black River rolls over Brookside

SULLIVAN TWP. — With his Black River football team's offense off to a sluggish start Friday against Brookside, coach Kyle Clark went deep into the archives for a spark and busted out a little razzle dazzle to fan the flames. Once that happened, Seth Gaspari caught fire with five touchdowns and the Pirates exploded for an impressive 47-14 Lorain County League victory over Brookside that was all but decided in a matter of three minutes. Black River (4-4, 3-2) is now a heavy favorite to reach the Division VI, Region 21 playoffs after manhandling the young, much-improved Cardinals (3-5, 2-3) over the final 27 minutes. Whether the Pirates avoid reigning state champion Kirtland in the opening round remains to be seen, but they're focused on the present with tough games against Clearview (6-1, 3-1) and Columbia (6-2, 4-1) to close the regular season. "We saw what our weak points were and we went over that in a timeout we took," said Gaspari, who became the sixth player in school history to score five TDs in a game. "After that, I'd say we played a perfect game. Our blocks were incredible, the holes were massive and all the credit goes to the line. If they weren't blocking, we wouldn't have put up 47 points." Looking to regroup after having a 49-yard Gaspari TD called back for an illegal formation, losing a muffed punt and throwing an interception, Black River found what it was looking for when it lined up in a T-formation with an unbalanced line. Freshman quarterback Hunter Varney faked a dive to fullback Jayce Hopek and handed off-tackle to Gaspari, who burst through a gigantic hole created initially by guard Colton Moskal and right tackle Owen Chapman for a 43-yard touchdown with 2:51 left in the first half. The T-formation was a high school football staple in the 1960s and early 1970s before fading in favor of the I-formation, but Clark brought it back when he took over as offensive play-caller last week against Oberlin. The double dive was a signature play of former Pirates coach Al Young and one Clark ran hundreds of times as a quarterback for the school from 2000-03. Gaspari (16 carries, 175 yards, 4 TDs), Hopek (6, 28) and Bryce Murray (2 carries, 49 yards) combined for 24 carries for 252 yards (10.5 average), with most of their longest gains coming out of the T-formation. "I like it. It's a great play," Gaspari said of the double-dive series. "Nobody is going to know where the ball is when it's that tight." "The play-calling, I've really liked it so far," two-way tackle Lukas Steinbrenner said. "We've changed it up a little bit with almost half as many plays. It's a lot more simple and makes more sense." A Hopek interception set up the momentum-snatcher shortly after Gaspari's ice-breaking TD. Black River eventually faced third down from the 11 with nine seconds left before halftime, called timeout and lined up Varney in the shotgun with four wide receivers. The right-hander looked left and kept his eyes in that direction before lofting a no-look floater backside, where speedy Alex Woolfrom beat his defender on a post route and snared a critical touchdown. Gaspari took the second-half kickoff 85 yards to the house to make the score 19-0. While Brookside countered with a 3-yard Mason Waechter touchdown pass to Colton Casey, Black River punched right back when Gaspari scored from 48 yards thanks to key blocks from tight end Gianni Bonidie and pulling center Trenton Delesky. Gaspari added TDs from 2 and 9 yards to initiate the running clock, while Murray returned a partially blocked punt by Chapman 35 yards to cap the Pirates' scoring. Brookside, which didn't get much offense outside of running Tyler Kitzberger (25 carries, 90 yards) behind 260-pound left tackle Carter Shuster, saw 76 of its 225 yards total offense come on a rushing TD by sophomore Edward Catanese III with 3:17 remaining in the game. "Honestly, (the game changed) when our defense starting clicking," Steinbrenner said. "We shut them out on the first drive and they started getting on us, but we really started to dial it in and get better. "Then we had really big runs on offense, which can really demoralize the other team." Contact Albert Grindle at (330) 721-4043 or agrindle@medina-gazette.com. Black River 47, Brookside 14 BROOKSIDE 0 0 6 8 — 14 BLACK RIVER 0 13 20 14 — 47 Second BR — Seth Gaspari 43 run (Mason Koberna kick), 2:51. BR — Alex Woolfrom 11 pass from Hunter Varney (kick failed), 0:05. Third BR — Gaspari 85 kickoff return (kick blocked), 11:47. Bro — Colton Casey 3 pass from Mason Waechter (pass failed), 6:28. BR — Gaspari 48 run (Varney run), 5:28. BR — Gaspari 2 run (kick blocked), 1:23. Fourth BR — Gaspari 9 run (Bryce Murray pass from Varney), 10:08. BR — Murray 35 punt return (kick failed), 5;55. Bro — Edward Catanese III 76 run (Casey pass from Waechter), 3:17. &emsp;&emsp;Bro &emsp;&emsp;BR First downs &emsp;&emsp;10 &emsp;&emsp;&emsp;&emsp;13 Rushing &emsp;&emsp;28/164 &emsp;&emsp; 29/267 Rushing average &emsp;&emsp;5.9 &emsp;&emsp;9.2 Passing &emsp;&emsp;13/25 &emsp;&emsp; 4/7 Passing yards &emsp;&emsp;61 &emsp;&emsp;&emsp;&emsp;71 Total offense &emsp;&emsp;53/225 &emsp;&emsp; 36/338 Punting &emsp;&emsp;5/25.0 &emsp;&emsp; 2/31.5 Penalties &emsp;&emsp;2/19 &emsp;&emsp; 5/42 Fumbles &emsp;&emsp;2/1 &emsp;&emsp; 2/1 RUSHING: Brookside — Tyler Kitzberger 25-90, Catanese 1-76, Mason Gainer 1-(-1), Waechter 1-(-1). Black River — Gaspari 16-175, Murray 2-49, Jayce Hopek 6-28, Varney 3-9, Dozier Hendershot 2-6. PASSING: Brookside — Waechter 13-25-61-1-1. Black River — Varney 4-7-71-1-1. RECEIVING: Brookside — Casey 7-23, Alex Arra 2-16, Ethan Blythe 1-8, Andy Bilczo 2-8, Kitzberger 1-6. Black River — Woolfrom 2-57, Murray 2-14. MISSED FIELD GOAL: Brookside — Noah Akins 28 (BLK).