Behind sprawling Ridge High School, under the lights, in the midst of what amounted to a carnival, Westfield and Ridge contested a football game. Fans milled about. Ridge students donned pink shirts and coated the stands. Cheerleading moms fundraised. A snack shack churned out hamburgers and hot dogs, popcorn and pulled pork sandwiches. Smoke from the cooking wafted over the field.
The atmosphere was impeccable.
The football, at least on the Westfield side, was not.
Westfield suffered a 31-3 drubbing, a stunningly lopsided score given the expected parity between the two teams. The Blue Devils entered the game riding a five-game win streak that included two shutouts, three games scoring 30 or more points, and a Big Central (American Gold) conference title. They exited vowing to do better next time.
“We lost all three phases of the game,” said senior Gabe Dayon, the starting center and nose tackle. “We lost offense, we lost defense, and we lost special teams.”
Westfield’s main scourge was Ridge’s dynamic running game. The Red Devil quarterback, Jack Berisha, and the running back, Will Deady, looked like two gazelles springing through the trees of the Westfield defense. The game was played at two speeds: one for Berisha and Deady, and one for everyone else. Berisha scored two rushing touchdowns; Deady had one.
“We certainly pride ourselves on moving the ball on the ground and driving the ball,” Ridge head coach Andy West said. “It’s kind of the nature of our offense.”
That offense rolled through a dominant first half. Ridge scored a touchdown on its opening possession and tacked on two more by halftime. Things could have been even worse for Westfield: A successful Ridge surprise onside kick after its opening score was waved back on a call West later questioned.
Overturning the call gave Westfield quality field position, and the Blue Devils marched into the red zone before settling for a 20-yard Henry Hipschman field goal. Hipschman, a senior, stayed loose on the sideline all game, but he never got another chance to kick. Ridge’s defense stifled the Blue Devils at every turn.
“They were on point tonight, and we just weren’t,” Westfield head coach Jim DeSarno said.
Westfield jogged to the halftime locker room trailing, 21-3. The Blue Devils required a jolt, and fast.
But whatever changes the coaching staff devised at halftime quickly faded to irrelevancy. On the first play from scrimmage of the second half, Westfield senior running back Dylan Wragg fumbled, and Ridge recovered. The Red Devils punched into the end zone a few plays later.
“They just run a crazy, crazy offense,” said Trey Brown, the quarterback and a senior co-captain.
“Even though we prepped for it,” Dayon said, “we just weren’t prepared for [their] speed.”
Westfield charged downfield on its next possession with all the ferocity a 25-point deficit musters. But the drive faltered in the red zone. Westfield faced a 4th and goal from the 4-yard line. The Blue Devils went for it. They had no choice. Brown was stuffed short, and Ridge took over on downs.
Despite all the misery, Westfield manufactured one final glimmer of hope. Deep in the third quarter, junior Peter Del Re left his defender in the dust on a play from the 31-yard line. Brown threw a dot. Westfield’s final hope of a late comeback hung in the balance.
The ball fell incomplete.
The Westfield sideline groaned. On the next play, Brown rolled right and targeted senior wide receiver Peter Meixner, but Ridge’s Adam Meiner dove in front like a soccer goalkeeper to snag his state-leading seventh interception of the year.
The Westfield student section—relatively sizable, for a game a 30-minute trek away—began its exodus.
West, the Ridge head coach, heaped compliments on Westfield despite the one-sided outcome. “I still feel like Westfield’s an excellent team,” he said. “They got good good guys. [Brown] is excellent. [Wragg] is excellent. Good receivers with good speed. And the line is pretty slapped together, too.”
“They’re certainly going to rebound from this,” West added. Westfield’s response to its first loss of the season suggests so. The Blue Devils fell to Watchung Hills to open the year, then reeled off a five-game winning streak.
This loss was disappointing, if not demoralizing.
With about five minutes to play and the game all but over, the Westfield cheerleaders completed a chant. The Westfield parents clapped.
They had little else to cheer for.
