Whitesboro repeats as Class A football champ; Morrisville-Eaton, Lowville win titles
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SYRACUSE — Whitesboro was one of three 2024 Section III football champions on the field Friday on the opening night of 2025’s championship weekend and was the only team to successfully repeat.
Class A Whitesboro defeated East Syracuse-Minoa 21-7, the same score from a victory over the Spartans during the regular season, and earned a third consecutive championship at the JMA Wireless Dome.
“This does not get old,” coach Curtis Schmidt said following its sixth championship victory in 11 years and 13th overall. “This is why we do it … and we’ve gotten it done the past three years.”
Frankfort-Schuyler, also a two-time defending champion in the eight-player division, was beaten 40-36 by Morrisville-Eaton, a team the Maroon Knights had defeated to start this season and the last to to which they had lost within the section.
Unbeaten Lowville Academy ended Dolgeville’s four-year reign as Class D champion with its 38-20 victory, a second head-to-head win this season.
Sectional championships for classes AA, B and C will be determined on the second day of championship play in the JMA Wireless Dome Nov. 15.
Class A: Whitesboro 21, East Syracuse-Minoa 7
Whitesboro jumped ahead 14-0 in the first quarter Friday and its defense effectively shut down an East Syracuse-Minoa offense that had averaged 33 points during a six-game win streak dating back to a previous loss to Whitesboro.
“Our defense is putting us in spots to win football games,” Schmidt said.
Connor McDonald scored two Whitesboro touchdowns, and Mike Hill, who returned to game action last week following an injury, got the defense in on the scoring.
After the teams traded punts to start the dome’s third game of the day, Frank Zupancic, the junior quarterback who made his first varsity start against East Syracuse-Minoa in Week 3, threw a 47-yard touchdown pass to McDonald to open the game’s scoring.
East Syracuse-Minoa’s Spartans (9-3) were driving the other direction following McDonald’s touchdown when Hill intercepted a pass and ran it back 69 yards for another touchdown less than three minutes later, putting Whitesboro up 14-0 seven minutes into the game.
Whitesboro (10-1) would not score again until the fourth quarter but its defense would preserve the lead. McDonald recovered an East Syracuse-Minoa fumble on a completed fourth-down pass late in the first quarter, but the Whitesboro offense turned the ball over twice in the second.
The second Whitesboro turnover led to a Spartan touchdown. East Syracuse-Minoa recovered a fumble at Whitesboro’s 33-yard line, and Robert Clifford threw a 1-yard scoring pass to Jay-Neil McDuffie with 22 seconds to play before halftime.
The Whitesboro lead was 14-7 at halftime and remained so past the midpoint of the fourth quarter. A Clifford pass fell incomplete for East Syracuse-Minoa on a fourth down to start the final period, and Whitesboro took possession inside its own 10 with Hill quarterbacking its heavy offensive package. A 37-yard run by McDonald gave Whitesboro breathing room, and his 6-yard run for a touchdown capped a drive that lasted almost eight minutes and left East Syracuse-Minoa trailing 21-7 with four to play.
“It feels great,” senior Whitesboro lineman Kevin George said. “Three years in a row … it’s like a standard at this point, like we had to do it.”
Whitesboro’s regional opponent will be Union-Endicott at Vestal High School on Nov. 21. Union-Endicott defeated Horseheads 21-20 in overtime Friday in Section IV’s championship game.
Eight-player: Morrisville-Eaton 40, Frankfort-Schuyler 36
The Morrisville-Eaton Mavericks completed the climb back from an 0-2 start to the season with 40-36 victory over the Frankfort-Schuyler Maroon Knights in Section III’s eight-player football championship game.
Morrisville-Eaton forced two late turnovers and took the final lead with one minute left in the game.
“I told the boys on the bus ride up here, this was going to be a game of riding the highs and who kept it going the longest,” said Don Johnson who is retiring as Morrisville-Eaton’s coach at the end of his 30th season.
The Mavericks (9-2) trailed early in the fourth quarter and fumbled the ball away at Frankfort-Schuyler’s 1-yard line. The Maroon Knights (10-1) drove out of their end and across midfield as the clock ran down. Morrisville-Eaton caught a crucial break when Gavin Baker recovered a fumble in the Frankfort-Schuyler backfield with 3:11 remaining.
“I knew we needed the ball, either on downs of a turnover,” Johnson said.
A 42-yard scramble by quarterback Landen Highers moved the Mavericks back into Frankfort-Schuyler territory. Wesley D’Imperio ran for another first down at the Maroon Knights’ 9-yard line, setting the stage for Highers’ go-ahead touchdown run with 1:01 left on the clock.
Morrisville-Eaton clinched the victory when Lewis Joslyn recovered another Frankfort-Schuyler fumble at the 28-second mark.
“We’ve had multiple game this year come down to the fourth quarter and who wanted it more,” said Morrisville-Eaton senior Mason Marland who ran for 72 yards and two touchdowns, and added 15 tackles and two sacks on defense.
The Mavericks were beaten 20-18 at home by the Maroon Knights to start the season, but were also the last Section III team to beat Frankfort-Schuyler in the 2022 sectional championship game. Frankfort-Schuyler had won 28 consecutive games within the section since that 30-28 defeat; four of the victories in that streak were against Morrisville-Eaton, including last year’s championship game.
The teams went back-and-forth in the JMA Wireless Dome Friday with neither leading by more than eight points at any time. Frankfort-Schuyler led 24-16. Morrisville-Eaton pulled even with a Highers-to-Baker touchdown pass and two-point conversion.
Frankfort-Schuyler would take leads two more times, and each time Morrisville-Eaton responded. Jerome Bowen threw a second touchdown pass to Jovan Myers late in the third quarter, but the Maroon Knights two-point run was stopped, and the Mavericks countered with D’Imperio’s 10-yard touchdown run and two-point conversion 90 seconds later.
Bowen ran five yards for touchdown on the first play of the fourth quarter, putting the Maroon Knights up 36-32, and the conversion pass was intercepted.
D’Imperio scored two touchdowns for the Mavericks. Jerome Bowen ran for two Frankfort-Schuyler touchdowns and passed for three, the two to Myers and one to his younger brother, Reese Bowen.
Class D: Lowville Academy 38, Dolgeville 20
Cole Zubrzycki ran for four touchdowns Friday as the undefeated Lowville Academy Red Raiders beat the Dolgeville Blue Devils for the second time this season.
Lowville (11-0) had beaten Dolgeville (9-2), winner of four consecutive Class D titles and more championships (21) than another Section III school, 22-6 at home in the third week of the season.
“We’re the smallest Class D school playing in Section III, and we lost the most players from last year,” third-year Dolgeville head coach Justin Daukontas said. “After all that, we were still back here battling for a championship.
“And we will be back.”
Zubrzycki had 46- and 34-yard touchdown runs in the first quarter, giving Lowville a 12-0 lead. Dolgeville’s Jacob Moore ran 8 yards for a touchdown to start the second quarter, and the Blue Devil defense forced a punt that gave the team a chance to score again to take the lead. The Lowville defense also forced a punt, and Devin Swiernik returned the kick for a touchdown that extended the Red Raiders’ lead to 19-7.
Zubrzycki ran for his third touchdown before halftime and his fourth to start the second half, extending the lead to 32-7.
Moore and quarterback Tim Gomez ran for Dolgeville touchdowns in the second half, and Ethan Myers scored one for Lowville.
The sectional championship, Lowville’s first in Class D, is the program’s sixth overall, having won five in Class C, most recently in 2019.
Lowville plays a regional playoff game at Vestal High School November 21 against the Section IV champion, the winner of a November 15 game between Tioga and Trumansburg at Susquehanna Valley High School.
This article originally appeared on Times Telegram: Whitesboro, Morrisville-Eaton, Lowville win Section III football title
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