Finnegan back where he started, but Friars fall short of Crestwood
PHILADELPHIA » Colin Finnegan gave Bonner & Prendergast a shot in the arm Saturday when the offense was going nowhere fast.
Finnegan replaced starting quarterback Justin Shepherd in the third quarter of the Friars’ PIAA Class 4A quarterfinal playoff game with Crestwood at Northeast High School. At the time B&P trailed by 14 points.
On his first series Finnegan ran for 50-plus yards and threw a 12-yard pass to Jalil Hall to give the Friars a first-and-goal. The Friars were playing with pace and seemed rejuvenated with Finnegan behind center.
On third down, Finnegan connected with Hall in the corner of the end zone for a touchdown with five seconds left in the third quarter. The formerly listless Friars had pulled within seven points of the Comets, their opponent from the unincorporated town of Mountain Top, out of the Wyoming Valley Conference in District 2.
And Finnegan was the reason why the Friars had new life.
“I’ve been preparing for something like this to happen the whole time,” said Finnegan, who threw for 61 yards and ran for 49 in little over a quarter of playing time. “I was able to get in and make a couple of plays. I wouldn’t have been able to do it without all of the other talented guys on our team. Defense kept us in the game. I don’t think it has anything to do with me, it was the whole team.”
Ultimately the Friars couldn’t overcome a pile of earlier mistakes, losing a 21-14 decision and ending their season just a couple of wins short of a state title. The two red-zone interceptions and poor clock management (the Friars spent all three of their secondhalf timeouts in the third quarter) were particularly lamentable.
The defense did its job holding Crestwood to six total yards of offense in the second half. In the first half B&P’s talented defensive unit gave up too many chunk plays, such as allowing the freshman quarterback to run 57 yards untouched to the end zone and the 2,000-yard running back to break free for a pair of TDs.
The offense sputtered on its final possession of the game. The Friars turned the ball over on downs with 2:15 to play, and without any timeouts, they could do nothing to stop the Comets from claiming victory.
Bonner & Prendie enjoyed arguably its best season in program history. Since the Catholic League joined the PIAA in 2008, no B&P team had ever made it to the quarterfinal round of a state tournament in a non-pandemic season. Their 11 victories tied a school record and the senior class was part of four teams that posted a combined 33-7 record in four years (including the pandemic-shortened 2020, when the Friars advanced to the state playoffs for the first time).
Friars coach Jack Muldoon admitted it was a difficult decision pulling Shepherd, who completed 7 of 14 attempts for 80 yards, a touchdown and two interceptions.
“Shep has been great for us, he’s a second team All-Catholic,” Muldoon said. “I felt we needed to change it up. … Colin’s a more physical player, we have a run
game with him. We thought, let’s get him in there and go up tempo. Yeah, it was a tough decision. It got us moving and gave us some juice.”
All during the game Finnegan was offering words of encouragement to Shepherd on the sideline. Finnegan stepped up on the field and showed what type of a teammate he was Saturday and during the season. Finnegan had the starting job earlier in the season, but Shepherd eventually emerged as the Friars’ QB1.
“He’s like a brother to me now,” Finnegan said of Shepherd. “It’s been four years. We fought with each other, and with the guys ahead of us before that. We’ve been through it all together.”
Crestwood outgained Bonner & Prendie on offense 224-81 in the first half. As was the case last week, the Friars made timely adjustments on defense. Junior linebacker Isaiah Session and junior defensive end Mylachi Williams were effective at stopping the Comets’ bevy of counters and sweeps.
“We kind of moved our tackles in and our ends outside a little bit. We tried to get them running side to side,” Muldoon said. “We knew that more than likely they weren’t going to throw the ball much. There was a sense of urgency (in the second half) to get to the ball and tackle this team, and we did. The same as last week (in a 33-21 win over Interboro). We spotted them 21 points and it was the same thing, a wheel route to that kid Abu (Kamara) ran and we had a busted coverage. It was a great play by them. They had some big plays and we really didn’t. We turned the ball over twice and they didn’t.”
Crestwood’s Noah Schultz ran for 136 of his 140 yards in the opening half. He caught a 28yard pass by quarterback Jaden Shedlock to give the Comets a 14-7 lead in the second quarter. Later in the period Schultz took a handoff and ran off tackle 76 yards to the end zone.
Shepherd’s touchdown pass to Hall (eight catches, 88 yards)
tied the game at seven in the first quarter. B&P’s run offense (103 yards on 24 carries) was non-existent, a glaring contrast to last week when Avery Hankey and Session played a huge role running the ball against Interboro.
The Friars can take pride in being the only team in school history to win both a Catholic League Blue Division and District 12 championship.
“This team in particular came in as freshmen and won more games than any Bonner team, or as many as any team,” Muldoon said. “We got contributions from everybody this year. We said to the group that it was going to have to take all of us and it did at every position. For us to get to this point was a big deal. Winning the Catholic League was a big deal. Winning our district was a big deal. … I’m very proud of this group. They did a lot of the right things during the year and the offseason. We have 17 kids who are going to leave and we are going to miss a lot.”