Defending champ Schuylerville ends Saranac's historic playoff run

PLATTSBURGH | Defending state champion Schuylerville overpowered Saranac 50-14 in a NYSPHSAA Class C football regional Saturday, Nov. 22, at Plattsburgh High, ending the Spartans' first-ever run to the state quarterfinals. Saranac, which reached a regional for the first time in program history, fell behind 14-0 in the opening quarter and trailed 20-0 at halftime. Schuylerville, ranked No. 4 and now winners of 23 straight, finished with 464 rushing yards and seven touchdowns on the ground. "It's a (triple-option) offense that we haven't really seen this year," Saranac head coach Dylan Everleth said. "It's a hard offense to replicate in practice. These teams like Schuylerville that make a living off of the timing and the perfection of that offense, you can only replicate it so much. "I thought we did a good job today of taking away fullback run game and quarterback run game inside the tackles. But when you commit to taking care of that, we give up something else. They were just on the outside with the toss today and a couple passes that got them out of some third-and-longs or fourth downs, things like that." Sophomore Max Montgomery gave Schuylerville control early with touchdown runs of 1, 7 and 9 yards on the Black Horses' first three scoring drives. He finished with 51 yards on 16 carries and four touchdowns. Blake Cumm added 128 yards and a 10-yard score, while Levi Michaud broke touchdown runs of 55 and 44 yards in the fourth quarter and totaled 116 yards on four attempts. Saranac's first points came when Tanner Fields returned a fumble 34 yards for a touchdown early in the fourth quarter. Moments later, Sam Larche brought back a kickoff 71 yards to cut the deficit to 44-14. "Much like the rest of the season, I can't tip my hat more to our guys for just staying in the game, continuing to fight and continuing to try to get us a spark," Everleth said. "We did that twice. It's the type of guys we've had all year. A huge part of why we were successful this year is just continuing to fight to the end." Senior running back Zander Daniels led Saranac with 73 rushing yards on 12 carries, closing his season as the program's single-season rushing leader with 1,621 yards. Larche added 64 yards on seven attempts. Quarterback Branigan Boulds completed 2 of 14 passes for 34 yards, both to Antoney Bingham. Schuylerville quarterback Ben VanVegthen went 5 of 7 for 63 yards, completing conversion passes to Ernie DaCosta and Cumm. DaCosta also ran for 126 yards on 15 carries. Saranac finished its season 8-4, earning the program's first state-playoff win a week earlier and reaching new postseason territory before falling to one of the state's top teams. Schuylerville advanced to the Class C state semifinals with an 11-0 record. "This is where I think (the program) needs to be," Everleth said. "We've got some of the best athletes in the area, and I'm just glad that the kids that we've had in this program have continued to just keep fighting to push the bar higher." — Schuylerville 50, Saranac 14 Schuylerville&emsp;14&emsp;6&emsp;14&emsp;16&emsp;—&emsp;50 Saranac&emsp;0&emsp;0&emsp;0&emsp;14&emsp;—&emsp;14 First quarter SCH- Montgomery 1 run (run failed), 7:25. SCH- Montgomery 7 run (DaCosta pass from VanVegthen), 2:14. Second quarter SCH- Montgomery 9 run (pass failed), 8:32. Third quarter SCH- Montgomery 1 run (Cumm pass from VanVegthen), 7:40. SCH- Cumm 10 run (DaCosta run), 0:40. Fourth quarter S- Fields 34 fumble return (Pflanz kick), 10:10. SCH- Michaud 55 run (run failed), 5:10. S- Larche 71 kickoff return (Pflanz kick), 4:56. SCH- Michaud 44 run (Michaud run), 2:24. Individual statistics Rushing SCH- DaCosta 15-126; VanVegthen 6-43; Montgomery 16-51, 4TD; Cumm 14-128, TD; Michaud 4-116, 2TD; Team 2-(-2); Palmer 2-2. Totals: 59-464, 7TD. S- Daniels 12-73; Boulds 5-(-12); Walker 1-2; Larche 7-64. Totals: 25-127. Passing SCH- VanVegthen 5-7-0-63. S- Boulds 2-14-0-34. Receiving SCH- Palmer 1-20; DaCosta 2-29; Cumm 1-11; Montgomery 1-3. S- Bingham 2-34.

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Defending champ Schuylerville ends Saranac's historic playoff run

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