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SCARSDALE, N.Y. — Scarsdale High's football team proved Saturday that, when it comes to points after touchdown, there is no such thing as a gimme.
Scarsdale's Kyle Picunko blocked a PAT kick with 2:27 to play in regulation to send the game into overtime, and Connor Adams slamed the door on Ari Shamery's two-point try in overtime to preserve Scarsdale's 35-34 Homecoming Day, Section 1 Class AA victory.
Connor Adams saw the play was coming his way, he said, and the defensive lineman had one thought on mind — "Don’t let him get in!"
Adams made the initial hit, stood up Shamery, and his teammates swarmed in, stopping the White Plains halfback shy of the goal line.
Scarsdale fans stormed the field to celebrate the Homecoming win. Adams said it was Scarsdale's first win on Homecoming Day in five years. It also avenged an overtime loss to White Plains in 2011.
The heroics were set up in OT when Scarsdale's Andrew Verboys Jr. scored on an 8-yard run. Scarsdale added the PAT kick for a seven-point lead. Then Shamery plowed in from the 1-yard line, bringing White Plains to within a point, and the team chose to go for the win with the two-point try.
“They came out in a power I and wanted to shove it down our throats,” Adams said. “I saw the alley, came through it, got there first and then my teammates did a heckuva job finishing it up.”
It was Scarsdale’s first win of the season and capped an offensive eruption in the second half and overtime by both teams as they combined for 62 points.
The second half and overtime was the antithesis of the first half, when the defenses dominated. Scarsdale led, 7-0, at the half, thanks to a touchdown scamper by Robert Plummer, one of three.
“It was weird because, in the first half, no one could score,” Adams said.
That changed in the third quarter. Plummer had scoring sprints of 56 and 76 yards and kicker Jeremy Smith booted a 29-yard field goal, the first of two on the day.
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