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ALLENTOWN: Redbirds win battle of gridiron unbeatens

Brown solidifies line for AHS football

By Justin Feil, The Packet Group
   Bob Brown’s name didn’t show up in the statistics, but he was a big part of the Allentown High School football team’s 24-21 showdown win over Nottingham on Saturday in a battle of previous unbeatens.
   The Redbirds senior didn’t kick the winning field goal — that duty went to Markus Colin, whose 27-yarder with 1:47 left in the fourth quarter provided the difference.
   He didn’t have a carry — running back Norman Williams led that department with 31 carries for 145 yards and a touchdown.
   He didn’t make a catch — wide receiver Jake Lewis made two, with a 91-yard catch on the third play of the game and a 28-yard grab to set up the game-winning field goal.
   He didn’t complete a pass — quarterback Nick Palladino completed enough for 143 yards.
   And he wasn’t the tackling machine that was Redbirds linebacker Frank Juba. Brown, though, quietly did his job in leading the Allentown offensive line to an impressive performance that helped everyone else do theirs.
   ”I think the line has played very well up to this point,” said AHS head coach Jay Graber after improving to 7-0. “Playing offensive line is not any easy thing to do. You never get any recognition. You go out and do your job. They’re a very dedicated group. They watch a lot of film. They’re very dedicated in practice. They’re a great group.”
   Brown, the senior left tackle, is the oldest, most experienced of the five linemen. He’s been starting since sophomore year when he switched from the center spot from which he’d anchored the unbeaten freshman football team.
   ”Once I got there, I never considered going back to center,” Brown said. “It’s so much more responsibility, but I love it.”
   Not only must Brown open holes for Williams, who doesn’t need much daylight to turn into something significant, but he’s entrusted with protecting Palladino’s blind side.
   ”I’ve liked having that role the last two years,” Brown said. “I was originally a center. Coach Graber thought I’d be able to work the left tackle better. Each year, I’ve gotten more confident I could protect the blind side. Nick knows he can trust me.”
   And the rest of the line knows it can follow Brown’s lead. He’s the one that Palladino comes to if there’s an issue with the line, and he knows that Brown will straighten it out using the years of experience that he has gained since he started in a new position for a varsity with growing expectations.
   ”I know the position they were in,” Brown said. “I was scared out of my mind. I didn’t know what to expect.”
   Left guard Anthony Bliss is a junior in his second year starting, center Jacob Golub and right guard James Roselli are juniors new to the starting lineup, and right tackle Zach Peterson is a senior in his second year starting.
   ”Sophomore year that was my first year starting,” Brown said. “That was the stepping stone. Junior year, I taught the guard next to me. This year, we had three returning starters and two juniors. We’ve been working to teach them everything. They actually learned faster than I did, which was surprising to me.”
   They have come together to make an offensive line that came up big against a Nottingham team that had yet to give up a touchdown to a first-team offense. That streak lasted just three plays before Palladino hit Lewis for a go-ahead score, but the game was far from decided by the one big play.
   ”They came back and scored two touchdowns on us,” Graber said. “They’re a very good team. A sign of a good team is a team that’s unflappable like that. We figured if we could get up on them, we’d be OK, but that wasn’t the case.”
   Nottingham responded with back-to-back scores for a 14-7 halftime lead before Allentown started the second-half with a grinding drive for the tying score. Nottingham went up again with less than 10 minutes to go, but Allentown bounced back with a 70-yard drive that Williams sweeping in from 10 yards out with 6:05 left, and the Redbirds defense did not allow Nottingham to respond.
   ”I think we were able to handle adversity well,” Graber said. “We got up early, but then we got down, tied it and got down again. We were down two times, but we never panicked. We just kept playing and kept playing. We came out on top in the end.
   ”We just talked about a couple different things that we saw in the first half and were able to make the right adjustments in the second half,” he added. “We gave up one drive and other than that, I felt our defense played pretty well.”
   On the offensive side of things, the Redbirds got stronger as the game went along. They ran the ball effectively and gave Palladino time to throw when he needed it.
   ”They were the most difficult defense we played,” Brown said. “We watched a lot of film, and our scout team gave us a nice look. They had a real good defensive line. We worked on pass protection a lot (because) they had about 10 sacks. I met with the team after we had a fumble and said, we have to be tougher than that.”
   The offensive line helped to pave the way for the final key drives to tie and then overtake Nottingham. They were able to drive into position for Colin to provide the winning points.
   ”He’s been in that situation plenty of times,” Brown said. “He’s been up and down lately, but in a clutch situation, he knows what to do.”
   Colin came through to provide the Redbirds with a big win. It’s just what they expected of the veteran kicker.
   ”We were completely confident in him,” Graber said. “We always have been. It was fourth and goal from the 10, so we kicked the field goal.
   ”We do have a lot of confidence in him. He’s been our starting kicker for three years. We know what he brings. We’re not afraid to kick if it’s fourth down.”
   The defense then held back a Nottingham team that had controlled its first six games of the season.
   ”Our defense is very physical,” Brown said. “They haven’t seen a defense like us before. Our defense is really physical. Everyone gang-tackled. The secondary played great. They gave up some touchdowns, but they prevented a lot. They’re a key to our team.”
   In the end, it was both sides of the ball, some easy to recognize heroes and some unsung young men in the trenches that came together to secure a win in which the Redbirds had to come back twice against an unbeaten squad.
   ”It says we can face adversity,” Brown said. “We’ve been through tough situations before. We have a lot of returning starters. We’ve been there before. We know what it takes to win a game. Whenever it’s happened this year, we’ve come out on top.”
   The win locked up the top seed for the Central Jersey Group III playoffs, when the Allentown knows it could see Nottingham again eventually.
   ”It’s a huge win. It gives us a lot of momentum,” Brown said. “We have to keep going. We can’t have any letdowns. Have to keep this train moving. We don’t plan to let up. We’re not resting any starters. We’re not going to let up.”