MOUNT CARMEL – In 134 years of Mount Carmel football, the Red Tornadoes had never faced Wellsboro until Friday night. Based on the result, Wellsboro wouldn’t mind waiting another 134 years to see Mount Carmel again. The passing game was given center stage for the first time all season, and the Red Tornadoes certainly made good use of it. Jaylen Delaney threw for 126 yards and three touchdowns, as Mount Carmel had its way with an overmatched Wellsboro team in a 49-0 win. No 1. seed Mount Carmel (11-0) will face No. 4 seed Montoursville (7-4) in the District 4 Class 3A semifinals next week.
“That’s definitely something we wanted to work on coming into this week,” Mount Carmel coach John Darrah said. “In some previous games, we saw some opportunities where we could have taken advantage of that a little bit. We just wanted our guys to get a little bit more used to it and to gain some confidence in it. I think we achieved that objective tonight.”
Mount Carmel continues to put up huge numbers in what could be a record-breaking year offensively. The Red Tornadoes were averaging 43.7 points a game through the regular season, which would be a good enough for a school record. That average improved a little bit thanks to a performance which saw Mount Carmel move the ball at will and pile up 366 yards of offense in the first half. On his team’s second offensive snap, Delaney laid out a nice ball that Aidan Brokenshire hauled in and went the distance for a 58-yard touchdown reception. Delaney also connected with Brokenshire on a 32-yard completion before Delaney, a first-year quarterback, scored on a 1-yard run to give Mount Carmel a 14-0 lead with 5:37 left in the opening quarter.
“He’s in a little different position where he’s the leader of the offense,” Darrah said. “He’s always been a great leader. But he’s thrust in a role now where he’s in charge of a lot of guys. I think every game he gets more comfortable in doing that. Obviously, tonight he made some big strides in the pass game, but I always think he could throw. The pass game is a lot of things, it’s protection. It’s the spacing on the routes. It’s knowing where to go with the ball, and obviously catching the ball. So that’s something we just wanted to work on as a team.”
The Red Tornadoes made it three touchdowns in as many drives when Cooper Karycki sprinted past the defense on a 62-yard run to paydirt, capping off a short, two-play march. Delaney threw his second touchdown pass to Jason Klokis. The senior fullback caught a ball in the right flat and rumbled across the goal line from 25 yards out, increasing the lead to 28-0 on the first play of the second quarter. Mount Carmel showed no signs of any hangover following the big win over Shamokin last week.
“The Coal Bucket is always an emotional game,” Darrah said. “It’s always a great environment and atmosphere here to play at home. We always want to come out here and never waste an opportunity to get better. We had a couple of things we wanted to work on tonight, and I think we achieved those objectives, and I do think we got better tonight, so that was a plus.”
Delaney completed 5-of-6 passes on the night, and his final attempt went to Karycki on a rollout to the right side, resulting in a 2-yard TD pass. In addition, Delaney went over the 1,200-yard mark in rushing yards. He put an exclamation point on his huge night by scoring on a 34-yard run with 5:05 left in the first half. The first half was almost perfect Mount Carmel, but it did end with a slight blemish. Josh Miller was sent out to attempt a 44-yard field on the final play of the first half, but a bad snap caused the play to go haywire, even though Miller did gain 12 yards on an impromptu run as time expired.
“If anyone says they’re good, they don’t need to work on anything, they’re nuts,” Darrah said. “There’s definitely things, I’m sure we’ll watch the film and see a couple more things. But yeah, we’ve always got to grow every week.”
Defensively, Mount Carmel did a fine job. Wellsboro was held to only 53 yards in the first half. Surprisingly, Wellsboro requested to play eight-minute quarters in the second half. The final two quarters went very quickly with a running clock, and took on the feel of a preseason scrimmage with plenty of reserves in for the Red Tornadoes. In the last two weeks, opponents have only scored seven points against a defense that continues to take steps forward.
“I think overall, the biggest improvement in our team from week one until now is definitely our defense,” Darrah said. “I think the last few weeks, kind of the vision for what we wanted our defense to look like, having all the speed on the field, and being pretty unpredictable. It’s all started to come to fruition, so credit to our guys, they’re playing well. Hopefully we keep that rolling here throughout the playoffs.”
Wellsboro 0 0 0 0-0
Mount Carmel 21 21 0 7-49
Individual Scoring
First Quarter
MC-Aidan Brokenshire 58 pass from Jaylen Delaney (Josh Miller kick) 9:21
MC-Delaney 1 run (Miller kick) 5:37
MC-Cooper Karycki 62 run (Miller kick) 3:49
Second Quarter
MC-Jason Klokis 25 pass from Delaney (Miller kick) 11:52
MC-Karycki 2 pass from Delaney (Miller kick) 9:24
MC-Delaney 34 run (Miller kick) 5:05
Fourth Quarter
MC-Austin Ventilli 1 run (Miller kick) 2:49
Team Statistics
…………………….W..………………MC
1st downs…….7………………….16
rush-yds………22-29……………..33-341
comp-att-int…7-21-2……………..5-7-0
pass yds…………62………………..126
total yds…………91………………..467
fumb-lost………..1-0………………2-1
pen-yds………..7-35……………..6-50
Individual Statistics
Rushing-Wellsboro: Kody Enck 3-21; Griffan Morral 10-14; Max Mascho 4-3; Reed Richardson 4-2; Team 1-(-11). Mount Carmel: Cooper Karycki 4-95, TD; Jaylen Delaney 4-49, 2 TDs; Jaxon Boblick 4-41; Austin Ventilli 5-38, TD; Jason Klokis 2-32; Max Karycki 1-23; Gabe Higgins 3-12; Josh Miller 1-12; Mikey Higgins 2-11; James Spears 1-10; Logan Shuder 3-9; Preston Pultynovich 2-9; Jayden Rotolo 1-0.
Passing-Wellsboro: Morral 7-21-2, 62 yds. Mount Carmel: Delaney 5-6-0, 126 yds., 3 TDs; Spears 0-1-0.
Receiving-Wellsboro: Mascho 5-43; R. Richardson 1-12; Jeremy Richardson 1-7. Mount Carmel: Aidan Brokenshire 2-90, TD; Klokis 1-25, TD; M. Karycki 1-9; C. Karycki 1-2, TD.