Beauty, of course, is in the eye of the beholder.
And because it is, sometimes the ugliest of wins can appear downright gorgeous in retrospect.
So while it was often grotesque to look at, Annville-Cleona’s third straight win will draw a loving gaze from the 2023 edition of the Dutchmen whenever their hearts and minds are reminded of one very special Friday night in late September.
Annville-Cleona 41, Kutztown 40. You had to be there.
You might be scarred for life, but you definitely had to be there to see A-C somehow pull victory from the jaws of defeat while simultaneously causing the football gods to avert their eyes from the ugliness of it all.
In a contest that featured 81 total points, a grand total of one punt by two teams that rarely throw the ball and enough missed tackles to fill every seat in the stadium, it was a shoestring tackle by A-C’s heart and soul guy that decided the outcome. That would be senior linebacker/running back Cael Harter, whose fourth down stop of yet another Kutztown drive that reached deep into A-C territory proved to be just about the only memorable defensive play of the night by the home team.
“I can’t do many more of those,” said A-C head coach Matt Gingrich, equal parts proud, relieved and disgusted with his team’s performance. “I hated that game. Kudos to Kutztown, they played their ass off. I thought we could have put them away in the first half.”
Read More: At Annville-Cleona High School, it’s ‘Keeping Up with the Gingrichs’
“The neat part is we had every chance to fold in the second half and we did not. And I have no clue how we had one more point than they did. I have no clue how that happened. There were a lot of big plays at the end, a lot of kids stepping up.”
No one stepped up bigger in the end for the Dutchmen than Harter and fullback/defensive back Bryce Keller, who came through the with the eventual game-winning score with 4:41 left, a 3-yard burst up the middle that came just a few plays after he moved over to relieve starting QB Cam Connolly, who was forced to leave the game due to injury after a 45-yard scramble that set up Keller’s winning score.
“I didn’t even know I was going in at quarterback at first,” said Keller. “I saw an opportunity and I took it and I took the consequences that came with it.”
The consequences for A-C would have have been rather severe had it not been for the heroics of Keller, Harter, and Connolly, who combined for 388 of the Dutchmen’s whopping 406 rushing yards.
And they needed every one of those yards to hold off a spirited challenge from Kutztown (2-4), which was led by QB Colten Mathias, who threw for two touchdowns and ran for another, and running back Brenden Ackley, whose 24-yard scoring romp with 8:56 left gave Kutztown its final lead of the back and forth affair at 40-34.
“It’s amazing to play in a game like this,” said Harter. “You just have to battle it out with your brothers and hope you come out on top. At the end of the day, we’re a family and we put it all together and won by one point and that’s all we had to do.”
After Keller’s go-ahead score and the ensuing extra point courtesy of birthday boy kicker Mina Elzek, the A-C family still had to withstand another Kutztown invasion of its territory.
It came in the form of yet another productive march down the field that put the visitors deep in A-C territory with the clock winding down under a minute to play.
And just as it appeared that A-C was about to give up the lead one final time, its resolve stiffened.
On a 4th and 3 play, Ackley took the handoff and sprinted toward the outside with his eyes directed toward the right corner of the end zone.
But Harter had other ideas, chasing Ackley down and taking him down with a desperate lunge and a shoestring tackle that would be his 11th and most memorable tackle of the night, if not his life.
“He was close to not touching him ” said Gingrich said of Harter’s game-saving stop. “That was a shoelace.”
“I played like crap a little bit tonight,” said Harter. “I missed some plays I should have had coming through on the sweeps. I knew I had one chance to make the tackle, and saw the hole, grabbed him by his shoelaces and hoped he would fall.”
And because of Harter’s final play heroics, the Dutchmen celebrated a most dramatic victory that was both not completely earned, yet richly deserved, if that makes any sense at all.
And why should it, since nothing else that transpired Friday night seemed to anyway.
But somehow, a team that Gingrich admitted he was ready to give up on just a few short weeks ago, now finds itself with a 4-2 record and three straight victories to take on the road to next week’s Section 5 first place showdown at perennial nemesis Lancaster Catholic.
“After (losses to) ELCO and Littlestown, I really had doubts we’d win another game. I had a lot of self-doubt. The last 14 quarters they have not been perfect, but they have been perfect efforts.”
Annville-Cleona quarterback Dominic Casciotti chases down Kutztown’s # 10 as he runs into the endzone. (Will Trostel) Annville-Cleona running back Bryce Keller runs into the endzone for a touchdown. (Will Trostel) Annville-Cleona kicker Cameron Connelly kicks off to Kutztown. (Will Trostel) Annville-Cleona quarterback Cameron Connelly celebrates with teammates after running in for a touchdown. (Will Trostel)
Annville-Cleona Dutchmen
Read all our coverage of the Dutchmen here.
Roster
Head Coach: Matt Gingrich
Assistant Coaches: Joe Heckard, Greg Keener, Joe Shay, Jon Bopp, Drew Speraw, Cody Dodson, Jonathan Lum, Mike Miller
| Jersey Number | Name | Grade | Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Miles Riehl | 11 | WR/DB |
| 2 | Cash Watson | 12 | WR/DB |
| 3 | Carson Grow | 12 | WR/DB |
| 4 | Cael Harter | 12 | RB/DB |
| 6 | Noah Riehl | 10 | WR/DB |
| 7 | Wyatt Mase | 10 | QB/DB |
| 8 | Liam Pulaski | 12 | WR/DB |
| 9 | Gavin Martens | 10 | WR/DB |
| 10 | Jonas Cupak | 11 | WR/DB |
| 11 | Bryce Keller | 11 | RB/DB |
| 13 | Ryan Barrientos | 11 | RB/LB |
| 14 | Jonathan Moran | 10 | RB/LB |
| 16 | Cameron Connelly | 12 | QB/DB |
| 17 | Kaeli Pennington | 11 | WR/DB |
| 19 | Yamaliel Navarro | 9 | RB/DB |
| 21 | Mina Elzek | 12 | K |
| 22 | Aidan Blauch | 11 | WR/DB |
| 24 | Hudson Sellers | 10 | RB/LB |
| 31 | Dominic Casciotti | 11 | WR/DB |
| 33 | Luke Wentling | 10 | RB/LB |
| 35 | Jack Getty | 11 | WR/DB |
| 36 | Ivan Kreider | 11 | TE/LB |
| 41 | Jonathon Shay | 11 | RB/DL |
| 44 | Levi Heckard | 10 | TE/DL |
| 50 | Dan Bright-Walck | 10 | OL/DL |
| 51 | Alex Hemperly | 11 | OL/LB |
| 52 | Damien Miller | 12 | OL/DL |
| 53 | Anthony Gardner | 12 | OL/DL |
| 54 | Malacai Victa | 11 | OL/DL |
| 55 | Travis Wilk | 10 | OL/DL |
| 59 | Jordan Nickens | 10 | OL/DL |
| 64 | Armani Santos | 10 | OL/DL |
| 68 | Nathanael Sanchez | 10 | OL/DL |
| 70 | Blake Meyer | 10 | OL/DL |
| 72 | Alec Tetzlaff | 12 | OL/DL |
| 75 | Carter Smith | 12 | OL/DL |
| 76 | Preston Bomgardner | 11 | OL/DL |
| 77 | Jaxon Speece | 9 | OL/DL |
| 87 | Darrian Holloway | 12 | TE/LB |
| 89 | Timothy Montijo | 12 | RB/DL |
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