Rocks fall short in title bid

East Rockaway's football team had been defying the odds since the final Saturday of the regular season, earning its way into the playoffs with an upset win in Week 8, and made a magical run to the Nassau Conference IV championship game.

But the Rocks' quest for the first county title in program history fell short Thursday night at Hofstra's Shuart Stadium despite a solid effort on both sides of the ball.

Second-seeded Roosevelt held off No. 6 East Rockaway, 21-14, behind Erin Parker's 185 yards rushing and two long touchdowns and a bend-but-don’t-break defense late in the fourth quarter.

“I’m really proud of this team,” Rocks head coach Russel Pajer said. “We went from being out of the playoffs a month ago to within one or two plays of winning the whole thing.”

It’s the first county championship since 2006 for the Rough Riders (9-2), who scored the winning touchdown with 10:58 remaining on a fourth-down, 7-yard pass from quarterback Robert Sweeney to wideout Teddy Santana.

“I expected nothing but a close game,” said Roosevelt head coach Joe Vito, a 1979 East Rockaway graduate and uncle of Rocks assistant coach Dan Vito. “They had the ball more than we did, but we’re a big-play offense and sometimes all it takes is one play for Erin to bust loose.”

Parker, who on Sept. 17 rushed for 167 yards and a touchdown in a 15-14 victory over the Rocks, broke a 7-7 halftime tie on the first offensive snap of the second half of a title game played in front of 1,000 spectators. He immediately cut outside and dashed along the visiting sideline for a 63-yard touchdown, but a bobbled snap on the extra-point attempt kept it a 13-7 game. Parker’s 64-yard touchdown in the first quarter was answered by a nifty 31-yard touchdown pass from Rocks senior quarterback Sean Bohan to Nick Ulip.

The Rocks (6-5) answered a second time with an eight-play, 60-yard touchdown drive that featured four different ball-carriers — seniors Ulip, Luke Fahrenkrug and James Geiser and junior David McClure. Fahrenkrug gained 31 yards on a double-handoff to the Roosevelt 8 and busted up the middle on the next play for a touchdown. Senior kicker John Neckles split the uprights for a 14-13 lead with 7:10 to go in the third quarter.

The eventual winning drive came on the Rough Riders’ next possession and began at their 43 and took 14 plays to complete. Parker had a key run for nine yards on a third-and-8, and Vito was faced with a crucial decision less than a minute into the fourth quarter when they faced a fourth-and-5 from the East Rockaway 7.

“A field goal crossed my mind, but we’re not a great kicking team,” Vito said. “We stuck with the same play that went incomplete on third down and it worked.”

Santana shook free in the end zone and fell to the ground as he corralled Sweeney’s pass for the go-ahead score. Santana then hit Parker on a two-point conversion throw.

The Rocks, though, knocked on the door in each of their last two possessions and moved inside the Rough Riders' 30-yard line each time but couldn't punch it in. Fahrenkrug had 101 total yards, Ulip added 62, and McClure chipped in 40 to go with seven tackles on defense.