Neuqua Valley leaves Saints seeing red

Neuqua Valley quarterback Alex Lincoln considers the patch of turf within 20 yards of the opponent's end zone - commonly called the red zone - his office, so imagine his joy when Friday night's Upstate Eight Conference game with visiting St. Charles East went to overtime tied 21-21.

Lincoln had already thrown 3 touchdown passes in the game, all to Josh Schaffer, including a 10-yard fourth-down hookup with two minutes to play that forced overtime. It turned out he wasn't done there as he capped each of the four extra periods, which begin at the opponent's 10-yard line, with scoring tosses - two to Connor Yearian, one to Schaffer and the game-winning 7-yard throw to Mike Camire - in a pulsating 49-42 victory, which was capped when Will Radostits knocked down a Saints fourth-down pass in the end zone.

"The second half we came out and executed, and overtime, that was the time of my life," Lincoln said. "We feel the red zone is our territory and when overtime started I thought we'd go down and succeed."

The thrilling victory not only sent a capacity homecoming crowd home happy, but will go down in history as the school's first overtime triumph.

"I'm not sure if it's the biggest win ever, but it's certainly the most exciting," said coach Bryan Wells, who has coached every varsity game in school history. "I don't know if I ever want to do four overtimes again, unless someone can guarantee we win."

Lincoln's aerial pyrotechnics not only won the game for the Wildcats (3-3, 2-2) but also managed to overshadow the performance of St. Charles East (4-2, 3-1) running back Wes Allen, who ran for 6 touchdowns for the second straight week, while also rolling up 254 rushing yards on 38 carries.

Early on, it looked like Allen would hog all of the headlines himself as he capped 65- and 68-yard Saints drives with TD runs of 5 and 40 runs as St. Charles East leapt to a 14-0 lead after only eight minutes of action.

Neuqua righted the ship courtesy of Lincoln's 20-yard TD toss to Schaffer in the final seconds of the opening quarter. St. Charles East, however, appeared to take control when Allen squeezed in from the seven with 21 seconds left in the half for a 21-7 lead.

But after rolling up 162 yards in the first half, Allen was limited to 62 yards before the overtimes, in which he scored all three of St. Charles East's touchdowns, while the could not take advantages of a pair of deep drives into Neuqua territory, which would end up being costly.

"We missed on a couple third- and fourth-and-shorts and when you don't convert them you can't win ballgames," said St. Charles East coach Ted Monken. "We had 21 points at halftime and didn't score in the second half."