Annual game proves to be another for receivers
HERSHEY -- The flashbulbs popped as Dan Persa stood patiently for pose after pose. Everyone, it seemed, wanted to share the scene after Saturday's Big 33 Football Classic with Pennsylvania's Most Valuable Player, who will take his quick feet and able arm to Northwestern this summer.
It was one of the few moments in recent Big 33 history that a quarterback, or any other position for that matter, was able to borrow the spotlight from the guys who usually own it.
"This is a receivers' game," said Pennsylvania wideout Derek Moye. "I mean, you've seen how every time we play this game, the receivers always score."
Yes, Persa scored two of the game's five touchdowns on foot and yes, massive Pennsylvania running back Henry Hynoski picked up a third bulldozer-style. But most of Saturday's stars, as has become a Big 33 tradition, were the tall, fast, skinny guys on the outside, who helped a watered-down team of Ohio all-stars stay in the game and got a slow-starting Pennsylvania offense in gear.
Moye, the 6-foot-5 Rochester product who will play his college football at Penn State, had a team-high five catches for 74 yards and a third-quarter touchdown grab that put his team in control. Six-foot-four teammate Toney Clemons, headed to Michigan, hauled in a 39-yard pass that set up Hynoski's fourth-quarter touchdown.
"We thought we had two good targets there with those guys," said Pennsylvania coach Tom Loughran. "They run great lanes and they catch the ball real well. The first play of the game we stretched them as far as we could and threw the ball. We wanted to let (Ohio) know, 'Hey listen, you've got to cover us deep,' and once we saw they were gonna play us a little soft then we just started taking the underneath stuff."
Their Ohio counterparts were even better. Kyle Jefferson, a 6-4 speedster who played for Ted Ginn, Sr., at Glenville High, scored Ohio's only touchdown on a 57-yard catch and run in the second quarter. B.J. Cunningham, Ohio's MVP, totaled 116 yards on four catches -- all in the first quarter.
The 6-2 Westerville native will play at Michigan State this fall.
There are those who will tell you -- and not without some merit -- that the talent level of the Big 33 game has been diluted over the past few years because many of the biggest stars are enrolling in college early and Ohio's North-South Classic, for the past two years, has been held on the same night.
If the game has lost some of its star quality, it hasn't been at the wide receiver position. Last year, it was David Williams and Aaron Berry on the Pennsylvania side. Mario Manningham and Brian Hartline on the Ohio side the year before. Ted Ginn Jr., Steve Breaston, Tony Johnson have also added to the strong tradition.
To its credit, the Big 33 has embraced that tradition. Among the game's unorthodox rules is one that allows defenses to play only man-to-man coverage, which big-time receivers see about as often as a solar eclipse. Big plays aren't just likely; they're expected.
"When it's man coverage, you can do whatever you want," said Cunningham, who made a pair of catches Saturday with a defender draped all over him. "It's just one on one, you and the DB."
That coverage helped the wideouts show off a variety of skills, whether it was the acceleration Cunningham showed on a 48-yard screen the third play of the game, the effortless route-running of Jefferson or the ability to catch the ball in traffic Moye displayed on his 12-yard touchdown catch.
"They made plays," said Persa, who combined with Chris Whitney to go 12-of-19 for 186 yards. "So it was real easy for me."
If past history and Saturday's performances are any indication, the receivers who played in Saturday's game could have a not-too-distant impact on the Big Ten. They were excited about their upcoming conference rivalries.
Maybe a bit more excited than Persa.
"They're great players and I wish them the best of luck in college," Persa said, adding with a grin: "Even though I will probably be playing against a lot of them."
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