ND title quest ends
St. Thomas More too much for Niagara champion in Golden Horseshoe Bowl
They might not end up as No. 1, but they still haven’t found anyone who can beat them.
St. Thomas More Knights can now stake a legitimate claim as the top boys high school football team in Canada after completing taming the tough Welland Notre Dame Fighting Irish 57-7 in the Golden Horseshoe Bowl Tuesday night.
The Hamilton Catholic league champions were ranked No. 4 in the nation heading into this week’s Ontario Federation of School Athletic Associations (OFSAA) Bowls Festival at Tim Hortons Field in Hamilton.
While they defeated the No. 10 Fighting Irish, London South Lions, who were ranked No. 1 in Canada by canadafootballchat. com, were upset by No. 9 Windsor Holy Names Knights in the Western Bowl, played immediately before St. Thomas More and Notre Dame went at it.
The other six teams in the country ’s top 10 are from outside of Ontario.
Over the past two seasons St. Thomas More has lost just one (Cardinal Newman last year) game, going 20-1 over that stretch and this year won its third straight OFSAA Bowl, and fifth overall.
Their iron-fisted defence pitched five straight shutouts to open the season and in their four post-season victories the Knights outscored the opposition 211-45.
It was the final game of the Knights’ Michael Chris-Ike’s astounding high school career and, for most of the first quarter, Notre Dame contained him.
But while they played well in the opening frame against their highprofile opponent, the Fighting Irish lost star running back Justin Succar after he’d had just two carries
Then, with very interested scouts from University of Connecticut in the stands to watch him, Chris-Ike broke lose and controlled the second quarter … and the rest of the game, for that matter.
He scored five touchdowns overall, and had a long major called back in the second quarter on a penalty, and chalked up 336 yards running as More pounded the ball for 434 overland yards.
Notre Dame, by contrast ran for only 21, but quarterback Brandon Graziani did pass for 148yards on a 10-for-18 completion night.
“It’s surreal, honestly,” ChrisIke said of his final game. “These five years just flew by and that was a perfect way to end my high school career.
“The O line always does a great job of blocking. Those are my favourite guys. We had to adjust to their speed and the physicality, but once we did we knew could win.
“Our defence did a great job of shutting them out so we could stay in the game.”
In fact, Notre Dame coach Tim Bisci said he was more impressed with the Knights’ defence, led by the likes of linebacker Ryan Leder and a punishing front seven, than he was by their offence.
And he was pretty impressed by St. Thomas More’s offence.
“The running back is a helluva a player, but their offensive line? There were a couple of times when he wasn’t even getting touched,” Bisci said.
“We have a lot of athletes; they have a lot more athletes. We lost some athletes and theirs just kept on playing.”
Key injuries on the Fighting Irish offensive line contributed to the Knights constantly exerting pressure on Graziani.
“We were piecing it together on the offensive line. We haven’t had injuries all year,” Bisci said. “It’s unfortunate, once we lost Justin Succar, that limited our run game, then we lost Gerrid Holton and Sean Croucher.
“Brandon was running for his life and it’s tough to play like that.”
Josiah Clarke, the 240-pound heir apparent to Chris-Ike, ran for 99 yards and two touchdowns while Savaughn Magney Jones had 45 yards receiving and Edgerin Hernandez-Williams had 42 yards.
Knights quarterback Evan Hillock was 9-for-13 for 133 yards, including a late first-quarter touchdown pass to Ethan Monoghan, which ignited the eventual St. Thomas More scoring avalanche.
“Words escape me,” St. Thomas More coach Claudio Silvestri said of Chris-Ike, who scored 15 touchdowns in his last three high school games, had one called back and had two long kick returns stopped at the one-yard line.
“He’s an incredible athlete. He’s going to the next level for sure.”
In an intensely-played Western Bowl, just prior to the Golden Horseshoe Bowl, London South Lions gave up a late touchdown to Windsor Holy Names Knights and will almost certainly surrender their spot as the top-ranked team in the country.
Will St. Thomas More replace them?
“We have no control over that,” Silvestri said. “If it happens, it happens.”