SOUTH WILLIAMSPORT – South Williamsport has been one of the most consistent programs in District 4 year in and year out, and one part of that consistency through the years has been its strong ground game.
After all, this is the program that produced Dominick Bragalone, who holds the state record for most rushing yards in a single season – 4,704 in 2014 – and the fifth-most career rushing yards in Pennsylvania high school football history.
So, it may have seemed a bit strange to see the Mounties play this year as they are throwing the ball more than they have in decades, and certainly more than they ever have under head coach Chris Eiswerth, who is now in his 15th season at South.
South’s offensive transformation this year may have culminated in Friday’s regular season finale against Northwest as Cole Gerber completed 21-of-27 passes for a single-game school record 307 yards and six touchdowns as the Mounties put a bow on the 2025 regular season with a 62-0 win over Northwest.
“We’re so proud of Cole, he’s just a sophomore and he threw eight passes as a freshman. Levi Butler hasn’t played football since middle school, so those guys are underclassmen and we’re excited about them,” said Eiswerth. “We saw as we matriculated through the season that the kids were accumulating some really good numbers and had good games against some really good teams. So we figured as we continued to go, we could do some things (through the air), so they worked hard and did what they needed to do and came out tonight and really put one together.”
In addition to Gerber’s single-game record, two additional single season records were broken on Friday. With 14 catches for 187 yards and a pair of touchdowns, Butler broke the school record for receptions in a single season – remarkable for the junior who is playing football this year for the first time since middle school. And in addition to Gerber’s single-game record for passing yards, his performance also helped him break the single-season record for passing yards as well.
Records aside, it was a simply dominating performance for the Mounties, who racked up a 581-79 advantage in yards, and also amassed 33 first downs in the game compared to just two for the Rangers.
“We’re certainly excited for the future but we really wanted to close out the regular season with a great game for our seniors,” said Eiswerth. “No matter who we get in the playoffs, this is more of a journey with these kids with quite a few freshmen and sophomores starting with just a few juniors and seniors sprinkled in.”
The Mounties scored on their first six possessions, and on nine of 10 possessions overall for the game. The only thing that stopped them was the half, and even then, they managed to get all the way down to the Northwest 2-yard line before Eli White was tackled just shy of the goal line as time expired in the first half.
As strong as South’s air attack has been not just on Friday but season long, its ground game hasn’t exactly taken a back seat as the Mounties had two 100-yard rushers on Friday. White ran for 142 yards and a pair of touchdowns on 12 carries, while Cade Lusk had 133 yards on 14 carries with a touchdown.
Lusk’s touchdown was South’s first of the game – a 16-yarder that capped an eight-play, 75-yard drive. Gerber then threw three straight touchdown passes on South’s next three drives – 11 yards to Butler, 42 to Butler and three yards to Caleb Johnson, the last of which put South up 28-0 on the first play of the second quarter.
White then punched it in from 10 yards out at the 8:05 mark of the second quarter to make it 35-0, and Gerber followed that up with his fourth touchdown pass of the night, this one to Neeko Bowen from six yards out at the 4:23 mark of the second quarter.
Gerber found Johnson for a 23-yard touchdown pass to cap a 10-play, 75-yard drive that took over seven minutes with the running clock on South’s first second half possession. He then hit Andrew Walter for a 10-yard touchdown midway through the fourth quarter, and then White notched his second score of the night on a 13-yard run late in the fourth quarter.
The Rangers managed to run just four plays all night on South’s side of the 50-yard line, and the furthest Northwest made it on the field was just the South 41-yard line. That came after Northwest’s biggest play of the night, a 24-yard reception by Noah Arnett, who made a nice catch to pick up the Rangers’ first first down of the night and advance his team from their own 35 to the South 41 late in the first quarter.
But White picked off Mason Bilby on the next play and South eventually cashed it into Johnson’s first touchdown of the game, which made it 28-0.
Shane Hempel returned the ensuing kickoff 31 yards to midfield, and the Rangers ran two plays in South territory before punting. Northwest would get just one more first down the remainder of the game, which came on a 12-yard carry on first down by Hempel late in the third quarter, and wouldn’t reach South’s side of the field again.
While the Mounties will head to the District 4 Class 2A playoffs next week, Northwest’s season is over. As disappointing as the Rangers finished the season with four straight lopsided losses in which they gave up at least 55 points in each game, they still made an improvement this season, finishing 2-8 after a 1-9 record last year. And with such a young team that featured just two seniors, head coach Stephen Nestorick is hoping to make an even bigger jump next year.
“We started out with a tough schedule but every game was tighter than last year and that’s what we were going for here with a very young team, only two seniors and we just wanted to improve year to year,” said Nestorick. “We hit the middle of the year and got a little hot, won a few games by some margins but then hit an injury bug pretty hard and lost some key pieces and that probably lopsided some of these scoreboards toward the end of the year, which is ashamed, but it doesn’t take away from the progress we’ve made.
”Next year, we want to take a much bigger step. We’re only losing two seniors and we love them, but we’re only losing two so we expect to take a bigger leap next year and get back after it and start turning these scoreboards around,” he continued. “If you look at some schools that were in similar positions to us a few years ago, they’ve made year-over-year improvements and we’re now looking to do that. We went from one win to two wins and now we’re looking to make that larger leap, and I think we have the guys to do that as long as they dedicate themselves in the offseason to a weight-lifting program.”
South Williamsport 62, Northwest 0
Northwest (2-8) 0 0 0 0 – 0
South Williamsport (6-4) 21 21 6 14 – 62
First quarter
8:27 – (SW) Cade Lusk 16-yard run (Paulhamus kick), 8-75, 3:33
4:10 – (SW) Levi Butler 11-yard pass from Cole Gerber (Paulhamus kick), 6-55, 2:15
2:10 – (SW) Levi Butler 42-yard pass from Cole Gerber (Paulhamus kick), 1-42, :05
Second quarter
11:55 – (SW) Caleb Johnson 3-yard pass from Cole Gerber (Paulhamus kick), 5-42, 1:41
8:05 – (SW) Eli White 10-yard run (Paulhamus kick), 4-83, 1:35
4:23 – (SW) Neeko Bowen 6-yard pass from Cole Gerber (Paulhamus kick), 4-58, 1:44
Third quarter
2:57 – (SW) Caleb Johnson 23-yard pass from Cole Gerber (kick failed), 10-75, 7:03
Fourth quarter
7:18 – (SW) Andrew Walter 10-yard pass from Cole Gerber (Paulhamus kick), 6-54, 4:29
2:39 – (SW) Eli White 13-yard run (Paulhamus kick), 3-49, 1:53
Statistics
N SW
First downs 2 33
Rushes-net yards 19-46 27-274
Passing yardage 33 307
Passing 6-12-0-3 21-27-6-0
Fumbles-lost 0-0 0-0
Penalties-yards 5-47 4-30
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
RUSHING: Northwest: Shane Hempel (14-35), Mason Bilby (4-8), Noah Arnett (1-3); South Williamsport: Cade Lusk (14-133-1), Eli White (12-142-2), Taylor Naugle (1-(-1))
PASSING: Northwest: Mason Bilby (6-11-33-0-2), Christopher Martinez (0-1-0-0-1); South Williamsport: Cole Gerber (21-27-307-6-0)
RECEIVING: Northwest: Zaiden Meeker (2-4), Christopher Martinez (2-2), Noah Arnett (1-24), Wyatt Orlowski (1-3); South Williamsport: Levi Butler (14-187-2), Caleb Johnson (3-84-2), Neeko Bowen (2-19-1), Andrew Walter (2-17-1)