By DAVE O’SULLIVAN
Staff Writer
On X @GDsullysays
HADDONFIELD — Jaylen Bishop is a 6-foot, 260-pound two-way lineman at Paul VI High. Not exactly your typical front-line guy on the hands team when trying to secure an onsides kick.
On Friday night, visiting Haddonfield was desperate. Having just scored to cut Paul VI’s lead to six points, the Bulldawgs needed to recover an onsides kick to have any chance of winning the game with 1:21 remaining.
But Bishop was there to pounce on the bouncing ball, securing a 19-13 Eagles victory that secured a second straight West Jersey Football League Continental Division championship for Paul VI. The Eagles have now gone 29-9 the past four years, including 15-4 in winning consecutive division championships. The Eagles’ only losses this year came against St. Augustine Prep and Notre Dame.
“Since the beginning of the season I’ve been on the hands team,” Bishop said with a laugh. “I caught a pick-6 last year, so I had to make it known that I could be on the hands team.
“We fought hard,” he continued. “We knew it was going to be a tough game because they are a well-coached team, so we just came in with the mentality that we weren’t going to lose. We took two losses earlier in the season, so we know what it takes to win.”
The first half was sluggish for both teams, as Haddonfield stymied the Eagles’ passing game by dropping eight players into coverage and forcing quarterback Daulton Phalines to try to find an open receiver in all that traffic in the secondary. On the other side of the ball, Paul VI’s defense was able to hold Haddonfield’s relentless running game in check throughout the first half.
The only scoring in the opening two quarters was Phalines scrambling for a 10-yard touchdown run on a fourth-down play with 40 seconds left before halftime, which gave the hosts a tenuous 6-0 lead.
But in the second half the Eagles were able to establish some consistency with the running game behind senior Elijah Wilson and sophomore Nate Klecko. Klecko — the grandson of former Jets great Joe Klecko and son of former Patriots standout Dan Klecko — had a big run midway through the third quarter that helped set up his own 6-yard touchdown run, and he added the extra point to give the Eagles a 13-0 lead.
“This means a lot. We won the conference last year and we just won it again. It felt good (to get the running game going). We were getting about four or five yards a pop, and that’s what you need to keep getting first downs. They couldn’t stop us,” Wilson said. “Me and Nate, they use me as the power back and him as the speed back, and that works well.”
“Listen, they are a good program, they’ve been a good program for years, and they are gritty. This is our second division championship, back-to-back, and to clinch it against them is sweet because you know they are a good program,” said Eagles skipper Dennis Scuderi Sr. “They had a good game plan. They weren’t going to let us throw the ball, they were dropping everybody, so we just ran the ball. We told our guys, ‘whatever they give us that’s what we’re going to do to win.’ We’re patient enough and I feel like we’re good enough to do either. We have two or three good receivers and we have two really good running backs — so we can play either way.
“Klecko is a sophomore and Elijah is a senior, and those two kids can run the ball. They are physical runners. They don’t dance around, they come right at you.”
Haddonfield (5-3, 2-3 West Jersey Football League Continental) responded early in the fourth quarter, driving from its own 22-yard line and eventually scoring on a great play call that saw quarterback Van Lefakis find a wide open tight end, Cormac Flanagan, down the middle after nearly the entire Eagles’ defense bit on a running play fake. That cut the deficit to 13-6, but Paul VI (6-2, 5-0 WJFL Continental) was able to grind away a lot of the fourth-quarter clock with its running game.
“It came down to our offense. We knew our defense was going to hold them down, it just came down to our running game and being able to chew the clock and take control of the ball,” Bishop said. “We made some adjustments (at halftime). They were running a three front so we knew we could pick up four or five yards a pop (with the run), so we just kept running at them. We knew we had the guys for that. Elijah is a hard runner, and so is Nate. He’s a smaller running back but he runs like a big guy, just like Elijah.”
PVI responded on its very next possession, driving down the field and getting a huge fourth-down conversion from Wilson at the Haddonfield 24-yard line. That allowed the Eagles to continue the drive and burn more clock, and eventually Klecko scored from 5 yards out to put Paul VI up, 19-6, with 3:51 remaining.
It remains to be seen where the Eagles will be seeded in the upcoming Non-Public B playoff bracket, but coach Scuderi believes his squad may be in line for a home game, or even two, to start things off.
“I’m happy for the kids, happy for the seniors, and I’m happy for this school. This program has been down for years, but now we’re back,” he said. “I told the kids before, and after, the game that this is the standard now. If you want to come here, (winning) is the standard. We have a long way to go. Their goals at the beginning of the year were they wanted to win the division, get a home playoff game and they want to win a state championship. The first one we did, the second one, hopefully we’ll find out in a week. The third one? We’ll see what happens. That’s the real challenge.”
“We feel like we’re playing well at the right time and now we just have to get ready for the state playoffs the next two weeks. We expected to be better, but we’re getting better each and every week,” Wilson added. “We have to work on the penalties and our discipline. We get to third-and-short and (a flag) turns it into third-and-long and then we have to punt the ball away.”
Said Bishop. “we feel great going into the playoffs. I feel confident we can win in states. We’re 6-2 — I wish we were 8-0, but you can’t get them all. I like the camaraderie on this team. Our time is running down together, but we come together when it matters most.”
NOTE: As both teams await playoff opponents, each still has one more regular-season game remaining. Paul VI takes on Camden Catholic the night before Thanksgiving, and Haddonfield battles Haddon Heights on Thanksgiving at 11 a.m.
Contact Dave O’Sullivan: sullyglorydays@gmail.com
