YORK — If Cullen McCarty gets tired, he doesn’t show it. Good thing, because York Coach Randy Small doesn’t plan on resting him often.
McCarty continued his running rampage over the rest of Western Class B on Friday night, rushing for 201 yards and two touchdowns as York remained unbeaten with a 31-12 win over Greely.
It was the fourth consecutive game in which McCarty, the son of the 1973 Fitzpatrick Trophy winner, Pete McCarty, has rushed for over 200 yards. He has over 1,200 rushing yards on the season.
“Do I worry about wearing him down?” said Small. “Not at all. He gets his motor going in the middle of the third period.
“He’s a freak when it comes to conditioning. And if I didn’t give him the ball I think he’d come over and kick my rear end.”
The victory improved the Wildcats to 6-0, two weeks away from a showdown with also-unbeaten Marshwood. Greely had a four-game winning streak snapped to fall to 4-2.
“Now we know where we stand in the league,” said Rangers Coach Dave Higgins. “We played Marshwood, which is a great team (and beat Greely 47-0). And these guys are a very good team, too. We’re just not an upper-echelon team, not in the top two, that’s for sure.”
McCarty scored York’s first two touchdowns – the first a 41-yard sprint on the Wildcats’ second play of the game, the second on a 2-yard bull rush with three minutes left in the half to help it move out to a 14-0 lead.
McCarty, who also plays linebacker, carried 29 times. And he said he wasn’t tired.
“I do a lot of conditioning in the offseason,” said McCarty, “and we condition during the week. In the game it’s all about being in the moment, the adrenalin.”
His second score gave York a seemingly comfortable margin. But the Rangers came back behind the passing of Matt Pisini. He hit Alex Kroot with a 20-yard pass in the back of the end zone with 34.4 seconds left in the half. Pisini was stopped on a conversion rush, and the lead remained 14-6.
That’s when the Wildcats responded with the drive of the game. McCarty got it started with a 20-yard run from the York 44. After he gained 3 yards on the next play, York pulled out a trick play.
Quarterback Cole Merritt threw a lateral to Jordan Pidgeon, who threw down the left sideline to Keelan Hynes, wide open behind the defense. Hynes made a diving catch at the Greely 3.
“I just threw it up and Keelan made a great catch,” said Pidgeon, who added that he never throws the ball. “I usually can’t throw. I got lucky. I throw a spiral once out of 20 in practice.”
Regardless, it put York in position to get a 20-yard field goal from Trevor LaBonte with 1.8 seconds left in the half to make it 17-6.
“That was big for us,” said Small. “It made it a two-score game again.”
On the second play of the second half, Mark MacGlashing took a short swing pass from Merritt, shrugged off two tacklers and raced 63 yards for a touchdown. LaBonte’s PAT made it 24-6 just 58 seconds into the third quarter.
“Randy does a good job with those kids,” said Higgins. “They’re all tough kids. They won every aspect of the game.”
Mike Lowe can be contacted at 791-6422 or at:
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