At first glance, there’s a lot that these schools have in common. For starters, they even share a border with one another as their two campuses sit about five miles and change apart. Beyond that, these are two of the quote, unquote “larger” public schools that Lancaster County has in its portfolio with one being a 6A-classed outfit, with the other being towards the higher end of the 5A rank and file number situation.
However, in terms of their most recent history comparatively speaking, for as much as both Conestoga Valley and McCaskey may seem to have in common with each other, if the topic shifts to varsity football, that five-mile distance on the map between them might as well be five galaxies.
For Conestoga Valley, while it’d be hard to truly define these last couple of seasons as the Buckskins’ golden age per se– after all, this is the same program that made it to a state championship in 1991 that also had its annual matchup with Manheim Central in the 90’s become something akin to that of a religious experience for anyone so fortunate to attend one of those legendary Buckskins versus Barons battle royales–these Buckskins of late under the direction of head man Jon Scepanski ain’t that far behind.
Back-to-back 10-0 regular seasons? Check that off. Back-to-back section championships? While inherently implied considering two perfect regular season campaigns, check those boxes off as well in CV’s favor. In fact, there has only been one obstacle standing exclusively in the Bucks’ pathway the last two years, the Exeter Eagles, with the group from Berks County being the ones to upend Conestoga Valley in the pair’s playoff meeting after having lost to CV in the section title game just a couple of weeks prior ironically enough. And truth be told, but the Buckskins have been so prolific in totality that they just so happened to come into this weekend as the proud owners of a 23-game regular season winning streak, albeit it one that required a bit of good fortune in the form of a last-minute touchdown to prevail against Dover in Week 1 to continue onward into this Labor Day weekend.
On the side, for the McCaskey Red Tornado, it’s admittedly been a bit of an arduous climb these past couple of seasons.
The bad news? McCaskey came into this game on Friday night at nearby Conestoga Valley almost on an entirely different flight path compared to their opposition given the city’s flagship public high school entering with an 18-game losing streak. The good news? The school tabbed one of the best and brightest minds (literally) around in head coach turned multiple-time author and historian, Dr. Todd Mealy, to lead the squad prior to the 2025 campaign with Mealy’s resume in leading high school football squads at stops along the way at Penn Manor and Lancaster Catholic being considered nothing but successful ventures while in charge.
The other bit of good news you ask? While yes, McCaskey did drop their opener last week to Columbia, this is still Week 2 of the season we’re in here. This still being a time where optimism should still be pulsating inside of each team’s camp in spades.
And hey, what better way to demonstrate that things are indeed improving and in the process of turning themselves around than by authoring what would arguably be one of the biggest wins for this proud program in more than a decade should they able to topple one of the hottest outfits around, these same CV Buckskins from just up the road.
Truthfully, the best and most accurate forecast of how this one figured to play itself out was largely written within the game’s first handful of plays.
Case in point, once CV senior trigger man, Camryn Bair, one of the Lancaster Lebanon League’s best multisport athletes, called his own number on a quarterback draw to move the chains on CV’s opening possession on a 3rd & 1 play to push the hosts’ attack near the midfield stripe, Bair then used his trusty right arm on the ensuing play from scrimmage before connecting with fellow senior, Jayden Conaway, as the pair of Buckskins’ hoopers come the winter time ushered the CV surge down to Tornado 15-yard line in earnest following their fruitful 40-yard pitch and catch. From there, after Jaziah Ramos jolted for a 10-yard gainer from his tailback spot to put the Buckskins on the precipice of kicking the door in, Bair did the honors by finishing what he himself had largely started as his 5-yard TD run up the gut made it a 7-0 Conestoga Valley lead following a Mason Andrews PAT with 9:36 still left to play in the opening frame.
Then, after holding the visitors from Lancaster city to nothing more than a three-and-out on the Tornado’s opening series of the contest, the hosts’ offensive troops promptly went right back to work.
In the drive previous, while Conaway had flashed his skill set as a back coming out of the backfield with receiver-like qualities, his true bread and butter, toting the rock, couldn’t have been more demonstrable than by his relentless, refusing to go down, 15-yard scamper with Tornado players draped around him like a cape, which had suddenly put CV right back on the doorstep of tallying another score in relatively short order. Fittingly, it would be Conaway crowning himself here as his 4-yard touchdown plunge quickly upped the Buckskins’ cushion out to a 14-0 difference with 6:56 remaining in the first period still.
Needless to say, while the dam hadn’t yet burst and totally flooded McCaskey’s fortunes by this point, it was equally fair to say that it was getting late early for the Tornado. Fortunately, they began scripting a promising attack down the field the next time they possessed the football.
The key cog within the McCaskey series? Amauri Paula most certainly as the Tornado junior multipurpose back hauled three key receptions on the drive, two of which came on third and fourth downs respectively to prolong things, with the white and gray clad guests suddenly flirting with entering the CV redzone following Paula’s third snag of the bunch.
Well, that was until Talon Young-Bennett decided to insert himself into the mix, however.
There, after seeing he and his fellow defensive mates surrender precious chunks of real estate to McCaskey over the course of the previous plays, the Buckskins’ senior lineman rose up and pounced on the loose pill following an untimely Tornado fumble, successfully thwarting the Tornado’s most promising journey yet to date.
Then, like a finely tuned machine, the Conestoga Valley offense continued to purr.
Sure enough, on the very first play of the second stanza no less, would CV find paydirt once again as Camryn Bair notched his second TD jaunt of the evening, this of the 13-yard variety, as the Bucks appeared well on their way towards putting this game away and on ice considering the 21-0 difference up on the scoreboard with 11:53 left in the opening half following Mason Andrews’ third consecutive PAT.
And while CV would surprisingly be forced to punt it away their next time with it following this most recent score, they simply made up for lost time when talking about their fifth offensive drive of the opening half as fate would have it.
For the specifics here, the key elements remained largely the same. Bair using his wheels to evade pressure and find the escape hatch – twice — from inside the confines of the pocket as a pair of Bair strolls had ushered the Buckskins down to the McCaskey 19-yard line. Turns out, 19 yards is all that was required before crossing the chalk for the fourth time in the opening half as the potent Bair to Conaway tandem provided dividends once more following this TD toss as Bair and Conaway found themselves as the owners of 24 of Conestoga Valley’s 28 first half points when accounting for the four offered via Mason Andrews by way of PATs, with the junior kicker’s most recent in the assortment making it a 28-0 affair, the same margin that remained once the final 4:10 bled off of the first half clock with the Buckskins comfortably out front and in command come intermission.
Even still, while the halftime deficit staring right back at McCaskey might’ve seemed like this was a hill far too steep to even try and climb upward from, the Tornado’s wherewithal and grit coming out of the dressing room to begin the second half appeared to be anything but fragile and shaken.
In fact, the Tornado took all of two plays to cross the midfield stripe inside the game’s third act courtesy of a pair of runs tallied by senior Jahsier Reeves and sophomore Wesley Ray respectively, as the pair’s 11-yard and 10-yard chunks put the ball on the CV 45. Then, the latter of two, Ray, who demonstrated his ability to both willingly meet would-be tacklers in the hole while also choosing to evade them if the opportunity presented itself consistently throughout Friday night’s affair, proceeded to rattle off a signature, cut-back against the grain type of highlight run that certainly would’ve made the season cut-up reel. Unfortunately, for both he and his teammates, a holding call would make that all showmanship for naught.
Then, it went from bad to worse.
Cruelly, certainly from a McCaskey backer’s perspective most of all, as if the negation of Ray’s TD jaunt wasn’t enough salt in the open wound, how about witnessing the ensuing play, a trick play which featured a pass thrown from receiver, Michael Mellinger, that was hauled in by fellow wideout, Robert Anderson, moving the ball down to the Buckskins’ 3-yard line, end in immediate heartbreak as a fumble recovery courtesy of CV’s Perry Boyd on the very next play promptly ended this McCaskey attack with absolutely nothing to show for it in the aftermath of the junior DB’s takeaway.
Turns out, not in that brief stoppage in the action called halftime did all that much to stymie what the Conestoga Valley starters had cooking on Friday night.
How’s 97 yards sound? Well, even that too might’ve been labeled as child’s play to this group of Buckskins considering that’s precisely how far the home team marched themselves down the field following the Tornado fumble, a drive that was capped off by Camryn Bair’s fourth touchdown of the contest, his second through the air, as his 6-yard touchdown pass to fellow senior classmate, Anthony Rodriguez, invoked the mercy rule given the 35-0 score that CV carried with them into the final frame once the final 2:13 ticked off the third quarter timer.
Then, come the onset of the fourth quarter, McCaskey was able to reap some tangible benefits to their night’s worth of work.
Chief among them, a 2-yard TD run standing up courtesy of junior fullback, Brusavion Baisch, which got McCaskey on the scoreboard, 35-7, with 10:42 remaining, albeit in a running clock situation.
Then, after seeing a second TD run of his go up in smoke following yet another holding call being tagged against his side, Wesley Ray finally got his much-deserved touchdown for good in the form of a 3-yard TD run on the ensuing McCaskey series, now making it a 35-14 CV lead with 4:14 left to play.
And while that same 35-14 score would become the eventual final tally emblazoned up on the scoreboard once the clock hit triple zeroes just a few minutes later, the end result and overall narrative coming out of this game was that two things really can be true at once.
Firstly, any signs of a potential Conestoga Valley fall from grace desired by their adversaries looks something if not totally premature at this stage, but perhaps outright incorrect entirely as these Buckskins look like they will yet again be one of the loudest voices in saying who makes off with the L-L Section Two title this season.
Secondly, while it might be easy to scoff and jeer at McCaskey’s losing streak sitting right on the verge on hitting 20 consecutive games, it’s easy to see from even the most naked of eyes that this program is on the right trajectory and improving right there in plain sight.
So yes, sometimes historical trends can be bucked. And McCaskey seems poised to do that in due time. But for the here and now, at least when talking about these two clubs, altering their recent historical trends will be a task best saved for a date in the future. For Conestoga Valley, that’s quite alright with them.