Franklinville-Ellicottville Football Team Victorious
Franklinville-Ellicottville Football Team Victorious
Titans Dominant In Season Opener On Newly Renovated Home Turf of Ray Gray Memorial Field
Franklinville-Ellicottville Titans senior running back Christian Swalcy (#23) carries the ball for positive yardage in the Titans’ 38-13 season-opening victory over St. Mary’s of Lancaster on Sept. 2 in Ellicottville.
For the first time since the pandemic-shortened Spring football season of 2021, the F-E Titans took the field at Ray Gray Memorial Field in Ellicottville, where head coach Jason Marsh’s squad christened its brand new home field with a 25-point drubbing of the visiting St. Mary’s Lancers on Friday, Sept. 2.
As part of an $8.4 million capital improvements project on the Ellicottville Central School grounds over the past year, the football field and concession stand area received a complete makeover, with particular attention paid to address chronic drainage and flooding issues.
In the game, senior quarterback Giancarlo Nuzzo torched the Lancers’ defense for 184 yards on 15 carries, including one rushing touchdown. Nuzzo gained large chunks of real estate every time he touched the ball and continuously put the Titans in the driver’s seat with great field position and short yardage situations.
“We knew he brought a special skill set to the table with his running ability,” Marsh explained of his quarterback. “He’s very talented with his legs.”
Junior running back Hunter Smith flashed the Midas touch, turning the pigskin to gold nearly half the times he put his hands on it; he found the end zone three times on just seven carries. Smith ended up with 49 yards rushing and scored a trio of gritty, two-hands-on-the-ball, in-your-face touchdowns with carries of 5, 11 and 9 yards. He also caught both of the only two passes completed by Titans passers the entire evening.
It’s worth noting that Coach Marsh only called five passing plays in this game. (As fans of last season’s edition of the F-E Titans will probably remember, their team often threw the ball more than five times in one quarter.)
“At the start of every year, you have to figure out what you do well,” Marsh explained. “And in this game, we definitely ran the ball really well!”
In fact, Titans rushers gained 307 yards on 37 carries and accounted for all five of the team's touchdowns, including junior running back Beau Bielecki, who rushed for 41 yards on three carries and scored on a 14-yard run. Bielecki also gained four points by converting on a pair of point-after-touchdown runs.
“We were just taking what (St. Mary’s) was giving us,” Nuzzo explained of his team’s success. “It was a great feeling to be back playing football in Ellicottville,” he added.
Although the final score of the game became lopsided in the Titans’ favor, the first points of the 2022 season came quite fittingly on defense - and in a most-unlikely form - a two-point safety!
After driving the ball the length of the field in their first possession of the game, the Titans disappointingly coughed up a fumble at the St. Mary’s 3-yard line; however, once the visitors took over on offense they immediately returned the turnover favor when their center snapped the ball over everyone’s head and out of the end zone. Franklinville-Ellicottville had its first points of the new season on the board.
After receiving the ensuing free kick because of the safety, the Titans got the ball back in great field position and quickly drove the length of the field. Smith capped off the first touchdown drive of the 2022 campaign with a five-yard run.
As glamorous as a 38-13 outcome may look for the offense and for offensive stats, it was the Titans’ ferocious defense that beat down and defeated nearly every scoring effort the Lancers threw at them the whole evening long.
With 8:32 left in the 2nd quarter, St. Mary’s passed for a touchdown on a fairly well-guarded play and scored its first points of the season. Unfortunately for the Lancers, that’s when the Titans defense dropped on them like a thick, wet blanket - containing and smothering every move St. Mary’s made until the game was well out of reach.
Junior defensive ends Billy Slavinski (7 tackles, 2 sacks) and Owen Chudy (5.5 tackles, 1.5 sacks) both stepped up to starting roles on the varsity squad this season and in Week 1, they paced defensive coordinator Chris Mendell’s stingy defense, which gave up just six points in the game until the final minute and a half when the visitors added their last score.
Clinging to a minimal 8-6 lead at halftime, the Titans took the opening kickoff to start the second half and quickly drove into scoring position, where Smith scored his second touchdown on the night - this one from 11 yards out.
“Hunter ran the ball hard,” Marsh said of his junior running back’s effort. “He broke arm tackles and had great leg drive; it was a nice night for him.”
Defensive takeaways in the second half (an interception by defensive back Noah Shenk and fumble recoveries by Christian Swalcy and Hayden Trietley) kept returning the ball to the Titans offense, where Nuzzo and the run game kept racking up the scores and pounding the Lancers into submission.
In what has to be one of the longest road trips for any high school team this season, the Titans will travel to the shores of Lake Ontario Friday, Sept. 9th for a 7:00pm showdown with the Wilson High School Lakemen, 40-14 losers of their Week 1 matchup with CSP.
Wilson is one of a pair of schools (Gowanda is the other) whom the Titans will play in 2022 that dropped from Class C to Class D for this season. The Titans play Gowanda at home in Franklinville in Week 6 of the regular season on Oct. 7th.