Bishop Moore defense rises up, but late rally falls short in California
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Bishop Moore heads into Week 3 of the football season figuring it could easily be 2-0, but that’s not the case.
The Bishop Moore defense, led by Giacomo SanFilippo’s two sacks and one by Cale Britt, held Palos Verdes scoreless in the second half Thursday night, but a late rally by the offense was stuffed by the Sea Kings and Bishop Moore (0-2) lost its second straight game 21-18.
“Tough loss, the kids played hard. We just dug a hole for ourselves and we couldn’t quite dig out.,” Bishop Moore coach Matt Hedrick said of Bishop Moore’s 21-11 halftime deficit.
It was the second-straight heartbreaker for the Hornets, who lost 28-25 to Hawthorne in overtime last week.
The Hornets start the season 0-2 for the first time since 2023, when they started 0-3 with losses to Edgewater, Eau Gallie and Flagler-Palm Coast. The Hornets won nine in a row after that, losing in the 2M region final to Bolles.
“I don’t know if there’s any (good) way to start the season with two losses, but we obviously were competitive in both games against two really good programs,” Hedrick said. “We felt like we had chances to win both games, so, yeah, it’s frustrating, but at the same time, the perspective is that we have a really good team and we could easily be 2-0. We’ll keep fighting and hopefully have a really good season.
“This is the best 0-2 team I have ever coached, I can promise you that.”
Quarterback Blake McCullough had driven Bishop Moore to the PV 29-yard line with 1:56 remaining in the game, but an all-out Palos Verdes blitz chased McCullough all the way back to near midfield, where he was sacked, essentially ending the game.
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McCullough was impressive for most of the way, spreading passes around the offense in between tough runs by running backs Deuce Bronson and Donovan Ferrufino. McCullough threw a touchdown pass to Magnus Talma in the fourth quarter to make the score 21-18. He also scored on a short run in the second quarter, plus the two-point conversion.
Bishop Moore, ranked No. 7 in the Sentinel’s Super 16 Coaches Poll, started the second half by driving nearly the length of the field, but McCullough threw an interception into the end zone from the 20-yard line to thwart that threat.
Hedrick was pleased with the way his defense stepped up and kept Palos Verdes out of the end zone in the second half.
“We tackled better. We gave up two really big plays on the back end in the first half. We actually got to the quarterback in the second half and didn’t give up any big scores,” Hedrick said. “We really, truly felt that, even down 10 at halftime, that we were going to win the game.We certainly put ourselves in position to do it.
“Defense played really well in the second half. We challenged them at halftime.”
SanFilippo and Cale Britt came up with back-to-back sacks late in the fourth quarter to force a turnover on downs by Palos Verdes, setting up Bishop Moore’s final drive. The Hornets drove to the PV 29-yard line before McCullough took the game-ending sack.
“We gotta do a better job offensively of finishing games and finishing drives,” Hedrick said,
Bishop Moore is still searching for victory number 200 for head coach Matt Hedrick. BM will be back at home next Friday night to face Melbourne Central Catholic, which has former Cocoa coach Ryan Schneider now at the helm.
Chris Hays can be found on X.com@OS_ChrisHays.
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