McManaway, Norwich Free Academy stun Xavier

MIDDLETOWN » Xavier will long remember Norwich Free Academy quarterback Shea McManaway.

McManaway torched the Falcons with a brilliant 21-for-31 second half performance good for 251 yards in leading NFA to a stunning, 40-37 come-frombehind upset win over the Falcons in front of 1,200 at Larry McHugh Field Friday night.

Truth is, Xavier couldn’t stand prosperity, giving away a 16-point first half lead and an 11-point fourth quarter lead. The Falcons led 37-26 with less than five minutes to play and couldn’t make it stand up.

McManaway (25-for-45, 332 yards), hit Jaheim Sprowl from 35 yards out to cut the lead to 37-33 with 4:37 to play. Then, after holding Xavier to a threeand-out, NFA drove 60 yards in 12 plays to win it, with McManaway throwing a 15-yard touchdown pass to Nolan Molkenthin with 15 seconds left in the game.

Twice on that drive NFA faced fourth down and twice — on fourth and three and fourth and one — the Wildcats converted.

“My quarterback was phenomenal,” said NFA coach Jason Bakoulis. “We came here and had success against a team with a great tradition. Our young kids just stepped up.”

Molkenthin is a sophomore and featured running back Sean Preston is a freshman.

Xavier had 443 yards offense — NFA had 450 — but in the second NFA half kept the Xavier defense on the field, running 43 plays to the Falcons’ 27.

“They executed down the stretch and made plays and we didn’t,” said a subdued Xavier coach Andy Guyon. “We couldn’t cover them and we couldn’t tackle them. But give them credit; they did a nice job.”

It was Xavier’s inability to get a first down late and keep possession that rankled Guyon.

“We needed to get a first down,” said Guyon. “But we didn’t get it.”

Xavier jumped out to a 10-0 lead on a 37-yard field goal by Sam Norris and a 27-yard TD pass from Will Levis (18-for-38,

277 yards) to Danny Taylor. But NFA cut the lead to 10-7 on a 29-yard strike from McManaway to Kevin Pomroy late in the first quarter.

Xavier extended its lead to 17-7 early in the second on a 2-yard run by Levis and opened that up to a 23-7 lead on a 3-yard run by Ty Abrahams (24-for147).

But no lead was safe this night.

In a preview of his endof-game antics, McManaway scored from 14 yards out with 5:49 left in the half and he scored again with 3:44 left to cut the lead to 23-19 at the half.

NFA took the lead on a 3-yard TD pass from McManaway to Molkenthin and with George Sechen’s point, led 26-23 with 5:44 to go in the third. But Xavier came storming back with two touchdowns — a 43-yard bomb to Taylor and a bigger 58-yard bomb to Kyle MacGillis — in the pace of a minute, 46 seconds to seemingly take control.

Things, however, were not what they seemed.

Xavier’s last real scoring threat came with 7:04 left when Norris missed a 39-yard field goal try. After that, Mr. McManaway was in charge.