LOWER GWYNEDD, PA — It seemed fitting, that after all the yelling and screaming, and diving and catching, and numerous dramatic catches in traffic, and threepeating as suburban champions, that the last person off the Gwynedd Mercy Academy field on Tuesday afternoon, carrying the equipment in a net bag was Keira Quinn.
The Gwynedd Mercey Academy senior, streams of eye black streaking down her face from an emotional aftermath, seemed to do practically everything else, almost running her father, Monarchs’ coach Tim Quinn, out of his shorts.
Keira, the Maxwell Club national high school flag football of the year, threw three touchdown passes and concluded her day with a 66-yard touchdown run off a bootleg in leading GMA to its third-straight Suburban championship with a 25-6 victory over a solid North Penn team, led by its own star, senior Amani Keys.
The Monarchs will now face the winner of the Philadelphia City Championship game between Palumbo and Conwell-Egan on NovaCare Complex on Monday, May 18.
Though afterward, it was hard to tell whether Keira won or lost.
“This was not easy, this was my last time playing on this field,” said Keira, fighting back more emotion. “I spent a lot of time on this field, and it’s probably why I’m fighting back some tears. We’re not done yet. North Penn was a very good team, and they had some great players and lot of friends are on that team. This is bittersweet, my senior year. So many memories have been built here.”
Keira’s exploits led to the funniest moment of the game, when she took off for a 66-yard touchdown run untouched down the GMA sideline on the first play of the fourth quarter.
Leading 18-6, on a pair of a touchdown passes to Rowan Cunningham and a first-quarter score to Reilly Graham, Keira reached the corner and turned up field. Her dad Tim tried keeping up, but almost stumbled when his shorts came sliding down his legs.
“I’m happy I was past him,” Keira said, laughing. “This is our third time in a championship.”
Under Keira, the Monarchs lost to Abington in the suburban semifinals as a freshman and came back to beat Abington in her sophomore and junior for the suburban championship, topping off her junior season with the Pennsylvania Flag Football Championship at the NovaCare Complex last year.
This season, with players like Cunningham, Graham, Lily Walker, who had an interception in the end zone, Ava Lapotosky, who saved a touchdown with a diving flag pull, and Shiloh Okiro, who intercepted the first pass of the game, Keira has possibly the best team she’s ever had around her.
“The last two games we played were highly competitive, between Spring-Ford and North Penn,” Tim Quinn said. “Both were well-coached teams, and North Penn did a great job today. This was a little bit of a civil war. I’m proud of all the girls I coached played today. Amani Keys is tremendous. We had girls on our own sideline cheering for Amani. I told Keira before the game to go out and have fun.
“When she turned that corner on the sideline (on the 66-yard touchdown), I was so excited running that I almost lost my shorts (laughs). This is probably the fastest team we’ve ever had here, and Keira is the greatest quarterback in this area. She wants to leave a legacy. But we still have more work to do.”
Getting by North Penn was not easy, although GMA made it look easy on its first two possessions. After Okiro’s interception on the first play of the game, Keira Quinn directed a quick five-play, 52-yard drive that ended when Keira hit Cunningham for a 10-yard score. GMA almost scored a third time near the end of the half, after Sophie Caufield made a spectacular catch jumping up between two defenders to pull down a 14-yard reception.
Quinn hit Cunningham for a 49-yard reception, which led to the Monarchs second score, a Quinn-to-Graham 14-yard score.
“North Penn is a competitive team and I know how good they are,” Cunningham said. “We wanted to keep Amani and Tessa (Wieloch, a national-level player) in front of us, and matchup with someone shorter. Offensively, having Keira gives us an automatic advantage. We wanted to chunk it out and move the ball. We have seven girls who can score at any time. I have only lost once the last three years here. We have more to do. You can see the drive in everyone’s eyes.”
Keys was amazing. She made a game-high 9 catches for 97 yards—including an incredible one-handed catch in traffic during the third quarter.
“We know Gwynedd Mercy really well, and they were good on both sides of the ball,” said Keys, who will be playing flag football at Eastern University. “I thought we could be effective against them, and we came in pretty confident. It was hard losing, but at the of the day, we’re still family.”
It was an emotional ending for North Penn coach Kevin Zebluim, who saw his team make massive strides since they first began training in January. North Penn got in the Red Zone four times, with one drive resulting in a Laila Bentz 19-yard TD pass to Wieloch on the last play of the third quarter, and interception and two drives on loss of downs.
“Amani is amazing, and she is a four-year starter and four-year captain and we will certainly miss her moving forward,” Zebluim said. “Seeing both these teams, it shows how much flag football has grown. We battled. It would have been interesting if we converted one of those two loss of downs for a touchdown, making it a one-score game. I told the girls afterward to keep working on getting better.”
After everyone cleared the field, the lone shadow walking off was Keira Quinn carrying the equipment bag, a chore usually reserved for a junior varsity or freshman player, showing she’s not too big to do everything.
Scoring Summary
North Penn 0 0 6 0-6
Gwynedd Mercy Academy 12 0 6 7-25
1st Quarter
GM – Rowan Cunningham 10 pass from Keira Quinn (pass failed), 8:24
GM – Reilly Graham 14 pass from Quinn (pass failed), 4:01
3rd Quarter
GM – Cunningham 6 pass from Quinn (pass failed), 4:03
NP – Tessa Wieloch 19 pass from Laila Bentz (pass failed), :00
4th Quarter
GM – Quinn 66 run (Lily Walker pass from Quinn), 11:47
Joseph Santoliquito is a hall of fame, award-winning sportswriter who has been covering high school football since 1992 and is the president of the Boxing Writers Association of America. Follow EasternPAFootball.com on Twitter @EPAFootball [twitter.com].