Zephs slow down Dibilio and Nazareth, 21-6

FROM KEITH GROLLER

Tony Trisciani talks about his Whitehall football team playing "hat in the gap" defense.

On Friday night, the Zephyrs had whole bodies and not just hats in the gap, especially when Nazareth's Chuck Dibilio had the ball.

Whitehall contained Dibilio and held the Blue Eagles to a season-low output -- a whopping 36.5 points below their average -- in a remarkable 21-6 victory at Andy Leh Stadium that puts the Zephs one win away from their first district title since 1997.

Eric Fiore ran for 109 yards and scored a pair of touchdowns and quarterback Chris Polony added 78 yards rushing and another TD and the rest of the story was the defense as Whitehall ended Nazareth's breakthrough season at 9-3.

The Zephyrs (10-2) will play Easton at Cottingham Stadium a week from Saturday in what should be a hard-hitting, physical District 11 4A title game.

The Red Rovers will want revenge for their lone loss, a 17-14 Whitehall win back on Oct. 1.

But if there's anything to be learned from what happened in Nazareth, it's that the same two teams don't always play the same type of games the second time around.

The Blue Eagles rode Dibilio's 222-yard, four-touchdown performance to a 42-35 win over Whitehall on Oct. 29.

Another shootout was expected Friday night, but never materialized.

Trisciani and defensive coordinator Mike Yadush tweaked Whitehall's defensive scheme, making sure that Dibilio had to work for everything and had people around him as soon as he touched the ball.

Dibilio still gained 127 yards on 21 carries and became just the second player in Lehigh Valley Conference history to rush for more than 2,000 yards in a season.

But he never took over the game as he has done so many times before.

"Any time you play someone for the second time, the defense has the upper hand," Trisciani said. "They're well-coached and so are we and we're both going to make adjustments. Our kids just made a lot of plays, tackled better and we were healthier on defense this time around."

Linebacker Andrew Harris, who missed the first Nazareth game with an injury, was a major force. So was, as usual, Glen Klein, Tanner Madouse, Braden Zeiner, Matt Bonshak, Malcolm Guya and even Fiore, who had a team-high six tackles.

Polony had just one stop, and it was his first of the season.

But it was a big one as he chased down Dibilio after a 35-yard run on the final play of the first half when Whitehall was in a prevent defense.

"We've been preparing for this game since we lost the last one," Trisciani said. "We tried to figure out where we went wrong with our gap integrity.

"We ran a slightly different scheme and the kids bought into it. Our guys up front and the linebackers did a great job and our secondary kept the ball from going over their heads for big plays. We wanted to make them go East-West rather than North-South which is what Chuck Dibilio does the best."

Just as effective as the defense in holding down Nazareth was the Zephs' offense because they controlled the time of possession with long drives, moving the ball effectively on the ground.

Though capable of big plays themselves, Whitehall was quite content to keep moving the chains.

The Zephs' two first-half scoring drives alone chewed up about 101/2 minutes.

"I kind of knew this wasn't going to the shootout that people were expecting," Nazareth coach Rob Melosky said. "I could tell their tempo was very slow and that was their game plan. They wanted to chew up the clock and keep our offense off the field."

Down 14-0 at halftime, the Blue Eagles got back into it with a scoring drive to start the second half.

Nazareth stopped Whitehall and drove to a first down at the Zephs 29 when Dibilio threw an interception on a halfback option pass. Tyler Artim made the pivotal pick for Whitehall.

The Blue Eagles would get just one more first down on their remaining two possessions.

"This was a team effort -- offense, defense and special teams," Trisciani said. "We blocked an extra point, which was big, we got a big kickoff return [a 57-yarder by Fiore] and we also got popup kickoffs by Josh Cirocco that kept them from getting big returns.

"We talk about TBA all the time – trust, belief and accountability – and these kids are now a step closer to their goal."

http://www.mcall.com/sports/varsity/mc-whitehall-nazareth-football-story-20101119,0,6787068.story