FROSTBURG — Mountain Ridge defensive coordinator Adam Patterson had two weeks to draw up a game plan for Allegany: That was bad news for the Campers.
The Miners, who usually play in an even front, debuted a 5-2 defense with a spot in the state quarterfinals on the line, and it caused the Campers all sorts of problems.
The Mountain Ridge defense held Allegany to under 200 yards, limited them to five first downs and forced five turnovers — resulting in 21 points.
Will Patterson took care of the offense, running for three touchdowns and passing for two more, and No. 2 Mountain Ridge downed No. 3 Allegany, 35-14, in the Class 1A West Region co-finals on Saturday night at Miners Stadium.
It was a choppy second half on both sides, as Mountain Ridge and Allegany combined for just six first downs after halftime, but a win’s a win, and the Miners are into states once again.
“Sloppy win, but we’ll take it. Survive and advance in the playoffs,” Mountain Ridge head coach Ryan Patterson said. “We need to get better. We need to execute in all three phases better.
“I don’t want to take things for granted, how well we’ve played and where we’ve put this program, but I also like where we’re at too. We just won a big game over Allegany to go into the quarterfinals, and we’re kind of upset about it.”
The victory was the Miners’ (9-1) eighth straight over Allegany (7-4) and 23rd in a row at home. More importantly, it advanced them to the state quarterfinals where they’ll host seventh-seeded Catoctin (5-6).
Mountain Ridge defeated Catoctin, 43-12, in Thurmont back in Week 2.
Mountain Ridge’s dominance in the first half Saturday proved to be more than enough, and it started on the defensive end, where the Miners forced four punts on Allegany’s first five possessions.
A pair of solid Mountain Ridge drives of 45 and 53 yards — both ended by Will Patterson touchdown runs — were sandwiched by two crucial Allegany miscues that afforded the Miners short fields.
The first such mistake was a muffed punt that gave the Miners the ball at the Allegany 37 — Patterson hit Andrew Ketterman on a double move for a 23-yard passing score to punctuate the series.
The second — an interception and 36-yard return by Eli Moore down to the Allegany eight-yard line with 21 seconds left in the half — resulted in a seven-yard Patterson touchdown pass to Owen Bannon that made it 28-7 Mountain Ridge at the break.
That Mountain Ridge touchdown was its second in 30 seconds, both occurring in the final 41 ticks of the first half.
Allegany drove 53 yards on four plays on its first series of the second half, capped by a four-yard Brett Patterson touchdown run. Patterson finished with a game high 94 yards on 14 carries.
The score clawed Allegany within 28-14, and it had its chances to get back into the game.
The Campers had four drives to cut the Miners’ lead to a one-score game, and, in order, they resulted in: fumble, turnover on downs, fumble and fumble.
The latter giveaway occurred on Allegany’s own 10-yard line, which Will Patterson punched in on the next play for a 10-yard quarterback keeper to put the final nail in the coffin.
“You can’t turn the ball over and beat a good team,” Allegany head coach Bryan Hansel said. “When we didn’t turn the ball over we were successful. We had five turnovers to their none, 21 points off three turnovers. That’s a killer.
“The first half, dropped punts and that stuff led to this. We gave them 14 points in the first half. … Defensively, I thought we played well, we just can’t turn the ball over that many times.”
Mountain Ridge had its share of miscues too, as two shanked punts during the first half gave Allegany the ball at the Miners’ 26- and 32-yard lines on consecutive drives when it trailed 14-0.
The Campers squandered the first chance thanks to a holding penalty and an illegal shift that pushed them out of field goal range. However, they converted the second short series on two plays — Jacob Salonish found the end zone on a 26-yard reverse.
Both teams struggled with the penalty bug, as Mountain Ridge committed 10 penalties for 64 yards and Allegany had seven for 50.
The Miners converted offensively in the first half, tallying nine first downs and gaining 173 yards of offense.
Will Patterson was a big reason why. The senior quarterback completed 12 of 22 passes for 101 yards and two scores and rushed for 83 yards and three touchdowns on 16 rushes — the long a 41-yard score during the second quarter.
Patterson is now up to 35 total touchdowns for the season.
“We were playing well everywhere and we were getting good field position,” the quarterback said of the first half. “We hit some big plays when we needed them.”
Owen Bannon caught five passes for 40 yards and a touchdown, and Ketterman caught three balls for 43 yards and a TD. Austin Frost had 12 rushes for 48 yards.
The second half was a slog for both teams.
Each offense combined for just six total first downs after halftime. Mountain Ridge accounted for four of them, and three were via Allegany penalties.
Mountain Ridge had an opening to put the game out of reach on Allegany’s first drive of the second half after quarterback Brody Williams went out with an injury, but Kain Sweitzer came in and directed a scoring drive.
“I thought at that time that we’d smell blood in the water,” Ryan Patterson said. “But kudos to them. Hats off to Allegany. They hung in there. They have some solid football players. They made some nice adjustments with the game plan moving Zach (Michael) inside.
“It just seemed like when we were trying get that kill shot we couldn’t get it, and it was frustrating.”
Trey Llewellyn, Greg Dishong, Parker Ferraro and Will Patterson recovered fumbles for Mountain Ridge.
The postgame interview didn’t sound like the words of a side that just downed its county rival by three touchdowns, but Mountain Ridge expects more out of itself, and it should.
The Miners are 32-4 in their last three seasons, and they know they’ll need to be better to get back to Annapolis a third straight time.
“We expect better, our kids expect better, our crowd expected better,” Patterson said. “We won the game by three touchdowns, I’m pretty happy with that, but we have work to do.”
For Allegany, the Campers came up short of the ultimate goal they set at the beginning of the season to advance farther in the state playoffs.
Still, this 17-player Allegany senior class accomplished a good deal, compiling records of 8-3, 7-4 and 7-4 over the past three seasons.
“It sucks it ends,” Hansel said. “Everything was lined up for us to be the (No.) 3 seed (in the state) and play Fort Hill in the state title game. It sucks to lose these seniors.
“They did things as sophomores going 8-3 that shocked a lot of people in the area. Last year, they suffered from the injury bug and they still competed. And this year, there were just games — Mountain Ridge twice, Oakdale — that we just didn’t make big plays when we needed them.
“I think this team is better than the record they have, but football isn’t a fair game all the time. Nothing is ever given to you, you have to take it.”