Hopewell Football Overwhelmed By Beaver, 49-17

Hopewell entered tonight’s game with a record of 2-1 but haven’t had to play a team with the overall talent of Beaver.

The Bobcats entered this game ranked in the Top 10 of AAA and tonight, they showed why they have a good chance of playing in the championship game at Acrisure Stadium.

Hopewell is a young team that’s still growing so the outcome of tonight’s game is no setback of their development. The bottom line is that at this point, they’re not as good of a team as Beaver.

A year from now, the Vikings will be in a much better position to compete with the better teams in AAA but they’re not at that point YET.

TIME, PATIENCE and DEVELOPMENT are still needed.

Beaver scored touchdowns on their first seven possessions of the game and were led by senior wide receiver and Villanova recruit Amari Jackson.

Beaver’s offense and special teams were explosive, in fact, on at least 4 of their possessions, they scored in 2 plays or less.

Hopewell’s offensive gameplan was controlling the clock, which they did, but they couldn’t match Beaver’s touchdowns.

After Beaver scored on their first play of the game, to their credit, Hopewell responded on a long, methodical drive, which was capped by a 4-yard TD run by quarterback James Armstrong.

That would be their only points of the first half as they went to halftime trailing 42-7.

Beaver received the opening kickoff of the 2nd half to go up 49-7.

After that, Hopewell went on their second scoring drive of the game. A big play in that drive was a long passing play on a slant from Armstrong to junior wide receiver Logan Triscilla. The Hopewell drive stalled but they put 3 points on the board, courtesy a 45-yard FG by Rocco Marcantonio.

Beaver then brought in their second team offense and Hopewell’s defensive stop of the evening.

Hopewell got the ball back and got in the endzone thanks in large part to running back Josh Brunton. First, the junior ran for 34 yards deep into Beaver territory. Following a pass interference on Beaver, Brunton then got into the endzone from 5 yards outs to make it 49-17.

FINAL SCORE: Beaver 49 Hopewell 17

FINAL THOUGHTS: Tonight’s outcome was not unexpected and should not impact anyone’s enthusiasm. Hopewell’s record moves to 2-2 with another equally difficult opponent next week in Avonworth. Coach Mottes team will need to regroup and find ways to get better, especially on defense and special teams.

The offensive game plan is a smart one for where this team is in their development but eventually, they’ll need to do two things: 1) find a way to trust Armstrong to use his arm instead of just his legs. 2) find a compliment to Brody Rock in the running game, whether that be Brunton or to work in jet sweeps with players such as Tre Cameron, Avery Bokor, John Ross or Julian Baldwin. They need the players on defense to worry about someone other than Rock and Armstrong running the ball.

Defensively, the Vikings have to find a way to get to the opposing quarterback. In fact, they’re still looking for their first sack of the season.

Through 4 games and a 2-2 record, this is exactly where I thought Hopewell would be and have done plenty to be encouraged by.

Next Game: next Friday vs. Avonworth at Tony Dorsett Stadium, Kickoff set for 7 PM.