Playoff-Bound Pleasantville Beats the Bears to End a Losing Skid
in Saturday’s Panther win over archrival Briarcliff.
By Monica D’Ippolito
A game seemingly meaningless on paper was all that mattered Saturday morning as two schools whose campuses are less than two miles apart renewed their friendly rivalry.
Pleasantville needed a win a little more than Briarcliff/Hamilton did, as the Panthers playoff hopes were still alive heading into the matchup, despite a two-game losing streak.
“We needed to get that losing taste out of our mouth,” Pleasantville coach Tony Becerra said shortly after the Panthers ended their recent skid and finished the regular season at 4-3. “Even though this game wouldn’t have counted for the playoffs, to us it did. We needed that momentum, we needed that winning feeling; we needed to get back on track.”
It looked like the Panthers did just that, getting back on the right track with a 27-13 victory.
“Coming off two losses, we just really needed the win,” said Pleasantville fullback Michael Hammond, who scored one of the Panther touchdowns. “It’s going to boost us through to the playoffs.”
With an Our Lady of Lourdes 14-7 win over Westlake earlier in the afternoon, the Panthers clinched a playoff berth and will take on Nanuet, whom they lost to 6-0 earlier in the month.
“No,” Becerra said, when asked if he was keeping tabs on the Lourdes vs. Westlake game. “I mean, I was made aware of it once their game was over, but we weren’t tracking them as the game went on.”
Brandon Castro converted on three third-down plays on the game’s first scoring drive. Eventually, he capped it off with a two-yard touchdown run, putting the Panthers up 7-0. The senior accumulated 63 yards on the drive and ultimately finished with 188 yards on 33 touches.
Pleasantville was down a few running backs, which led to an extended work load for Castro.
“Jack (Browne) tweaked an ankle in school (Friday) and we found out (Saturday) morning he wasn’t going to be able to go,” Becerra said. “He should be fine for next week though, but I was confident in Brandon doing the job.”
Briarcliff answered back early in the second quarter. On a third-and-goal at the 8-yard line, Bears quarterback Matt Heyda threw to Ryan Celaj in the flat. Celaj shook a tackle and crossed the goal line, but after the missed extra point the Panthers were still ahead 7-6.
With time winding down in the half, Pleasantville’s Baylor Rosenbaum had a huge stop on third down, putting the Bears in fourth and long. Briarcliff then punted to Castro, who broke a tackle and ran 38 yards the opposite direction for a Pleasantville touchdown – extending the Panther lead to 14-6 heading into halftime.
“I saw a guy coming from my left side, so I kept moving more toward the sideline and then Javaun Smith blocked him, so I saw an opening,” Castro recalled. “I kept going down and then saw another guy coming near my legs and I stiff-armed him and just took it all the way.”
On a fourth down and five on their own 37-yard line in the third quarter, the Bears decided on faking a punt. Pleasantville was not fooled on the play and stopped the Bears just short.
“We thought it would be more beneficial for our team to run the fake and we came up about a foot short,” Briarcliff coach John Consorti explained. “It was more who they had back there and (us) covering it, but that’s a part of our special teams, we run a lot of fakes. Just didn’t work out this time.”
Hammond eventually finished off the ensuing drive with an 11-yard touchdown run with 4:54 remaining in the quarter. He ended the day with 68 yards on 13 carries, which was good for a healthy 5.2 yards-per-carry average.
“It’s great,” Hammond said about the extended touches on offense. “I love to help the team when I can and, you know, for the next game I’ll just try to do the same exact thing I did this week.”
Late in the third quarter, Briarcliff’s Sam Hahn produced a physical 37-yard run, but before the Bears could build off the momentum, Hammond picked off Heyda on the next play.
Castro capitalized on the Hammond interception with a 10-yard touchdown run – his third of the game.
“I felt perfectly fine,” Castro said about the amount of carries. “I thought I would be winded, but I practiced hard all week, so I was ready for it.
But the Bears kept it interesting and gave their large Homecoming crowd something more to cheer about. After failing to convert on a third-and-goal from the 1-yard line, the Bears scored again on fourth down as Hahn got the inch needed for the touchdown and cut the lead to 27-13 with 5:09 remaining.
Even though the Panthers were able to recover the ensuing onside kick and soon ran out the clock, Consorti had plenty of praise for his undermanned team, which finished the regular season with a 2-5 record.
“We’ve got a great group of kids,” he said. “They’re going to fight until the end, good, bad or indifferent. At times, we don’t look very good, but they gave all they had so I can’t ask for anything more as a coach.”
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