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October 27, 2006 > Sports > Sid’s 34-game win streak ends with 12-7 loss to Jones

Sid’s 34-game win streak ends with 12-7 loss to Jones

By Stephen Whitfield | Thresher Editorial Staff

Thanks to some fourth-quarter heroics, Jones ended Sid Richardson’s 34-game winning streak Saturday, beating the three-time defending champions 12-7 in the Powderpuff Game of the Week. The loss was the first for Sid since the 2002 championship game, when it fell to a Wiess team that had won two of the previous three Powderpuff titles.

Jones (6-0) made the lone offensive threat of the first half, advancing to within an inch of the goal line early in second quarter. On third-and-goal, junior halfback Caitlin Goodrich was stopped behind the line of scrimmage for a loss of two yards, and a false start penalty on the next play pushed Jones back to Sid’s 7-yard line. Sophomore linebacker Alicia Alonso intercepted Jones senior quarterback Katie Chang’s pass on fourth down to end the drive.

The game remained scoreless until early in the fourth quarter, when Goodrich blazed past the Sid defense for a 39-yard touchdown run, giving Jones a 6-0 lead.

Sid (4-2) seemingly put the game away when, on its subsequent possession, senior quarterback Christi Disch threw a nine-yard touchdown pass to sophomore receiver Emily Mills with just under two minutes remaining in the game. With the extra point, Sid took a 7-6 lead.

However, Jones came back quickly. After Chang ran for four yards to start Jones’ next drive, freshman receiver Katie Schnelle provided the go-ahead score, breaking from double coverage for a 61-yard touchdown catch to put Jones up 12-7 with 1:20 left.

Sid still had a chance to win the game. Starting from its own 35 with two timeouts, Sid managed to get inside the Jones 30, but poor clock management — it took 30 seconds to spike the ball after a 20-yard completion to freshman receiver Ashley Thompson — left the team short of the end zone as time expired.

That Jones ended Sid’s winning streak is not a surprise. Its two contests with Sid last year were very close — Jones fell to Sid 12-6 in Week 2 and 19-7 in the championship game. In those two meetings, Sid won in part because it was able to stop potential go-ahead drives late in the fourth quarter. Disch said she thought the defense would stop Jones again after Sid notched its own go-ahead score.

“I definitely wasn’t thinking they were going to come back,” Disch said. “We had them right there, but things happen in flag football. There were missed flags, but it definitely wasn’t the defense’s fault. … The defense went out there, and they knew the game wasn’t over. They played hard.”

Jones followed its win over Sid with a 6-0 victory over Hanszen (3-3) in double overtime. The team is now 14-2 since the start of the 2005 season, with both of those losses coming to Sid. Next week, Jones will face Wiess (3-3), a team that is reeling from its 12-6 loss to Brown (2-3). Jones offensive coach Kendall Spence, a senior, said beating Sid bodes well for the team as it gets ready for the postseason.

“It pumps a lot of confidence into our team about playing them again if we meet in the playoffs,” Spence said. “That was the first really good opponent we’ve faced, so it was really good to come out and play hard against them.”

In its next game, Sid took on Martel (5-0), the only other undefeated team in Powderpuff, without Disch, who injured her knee in the loss to Jones. Sid fell behind 14-0 in the first quarter, and without a reliable passing game, was unable to come back from that deficit. Sid lost 14-6, guaranteeing its first two-loss season since 2001. With two games remaining against playoff contenders Hanszen and Wiess (3-3), Sid could miss the playoffs altogether. Disch said Sid cannot afford to take either of its final two opponents lightly.

“This is definitely the toughest weekend Sid’s had,” Disch said. “But we can’t overlook Wiess or Hanszen. We’re going to have to go out hard for both of those games, because … we have to win at least one more game [to clinch a playoff berth].”

After its game against Wiess, Jones will finish the season against Martel in a game that will most likely decide the top seed in the playoffs. Jones defensive coach Johnny Hanson said his team’s last three opponents will be challenging.

“Our first four games were four teams that didn’t make the playoffs last year, so we’ve been treating it kind of as a preseason,” Hanson, a senior, said. “Our season started today. It’s a pretty big deal, and now it only gets bigger and bigger as we go on.”

In other Powderpuff action, Lovett (1-5) got its first win of the season in easy fashion, beating winless Baker (0-6) by a 20-7 score. Baker also lost to Brown 13-6.

Next week’s Powderpuff Game of the Week will feature a battle between two teams fighting for a playoff berth, as Will Rice takes on Brown.

Men’s Basketball

In the Thursday League Oct. 19, Lovett (2-0) demolished Hanszen (0-2) by a 59-38 score, while Martel (1-0) won by an even more convincing margin, 71-31 over Baker (0-2).

Men’s Volleyball

Last Saturday, Jones (1-0) defeated Lovett (0-1) by a 2-0 score to start play in the Dig League, and Baker (0-1) won 2-0 over Hanszen (1-0) to start play in the Spike League.

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