Hardware heist

A year ago, the Dunkirk Marauders let a chance to beat Fredonia slip through their fingers. The Hillbillies left Dunkirk with another tally in the win column of what had recently become a one-sided rivalry.

But this year, Dunkirk got its revenge.

Behind 381 yards of offense from senior running back Kingston Hall, a 70-yard trick play touchdown to Jareese Gaines, and a touchdown-saving tackle from kicker Lauryn McCracken, the Marauders left Fredonia’s Orange Bowl on Friday night with a 45-22 victory over the Fredonia Hillbillies in their rivalry football game.

“This is huge. The Dunkirk-Fredonia game is always the most important game in our eyes,” said Dunkirk head coach Edwin Gomez. “… When you can get a win against your crosstown rivals, that’s always a little sweeter than the other ones.”

Dunkirk head coach Edwin Gomez is doused with water near the end of the game.
OBSERVER Photo Ashleigh Brown

The Dunkirk-Fredonia rivalry is often referred to as a game where you throw both records out, because for one night, the rivalry between the two communities is all that matters. That was even more true this year, not only because the two teams combined for only three wins on the season prior to Friday night, but because there was something else at stake this time: a trophy.

The inaugural rivalry contest for the Central Connections Cup was held in Fredonia this year, as Fredonia Mayor Mike Ferguson pushed for a rivalry trophy to commemorate the occasion.

He probably didn’t expect to be handing the trophy to the visiting team. Ferguson handed the trophy to Gomez, a Dunkirk High School graduate, before the entire team got a turn posing with the hardware.

“Honestly, I love it. I, personally, think that this trophy is long overdue for this historic rivalry,” Gomez said.

As a former Marauders football player who now serves his hometown as a city police officer, Gomez knows better than anyone what the rivalry means to his community. Bringing home the first trophy handed out in a rivalry that has stood for over 120 years can stand as an all-time athletic highlight for the Dunkirk athletic community.

Fredonia’s Luca Gullo tries to get away from a Dunkirk tackler during their nonleague game at the Orange Bowl in Fredonia on Friday night.
OBSERVER Photo Ashleigh Brown

“It’s huge, especially for some of the young kids that are coming up through the program, to see and experience this type of game, to come out on top of this type of game, it definitely motivates the young kids to start getting involved,” Gomez said. “It puts the backing into the Dunkirk football program.

That highlight could not have been possible without big plays on the field, and Dunkirk (3-5) had a lot of them on Friday.

On the game’s first drive, backed up on fourth-and-13 at the Fredonia 48-yard line, Gomez showed faith in the team’s strength, running the ball. Quarterback Gabe Valentine pitched the ball to Hall off left tackle, and from there, Hall did the rest. The senior running back dashed down the Fredonia sideline for a 48-yard touchdown to put the Marauders ahead early. McCracken’s extra point put the visitors ahead 7-0.

“In my head, I said I’m going to score. I just knew it. Something in me knew I was going to score,” Hall said.

Fredonia (1-7) immediately answered with a touchdown of its own on the ensuing drive, as Luca Gullo, the team’s workhorse running back throughout the season, carried it in from 10 yards out. A 2-point conversion was no good, so the Marauders maintained a 1-point lead.

Dunkirk did not waste any time answering right back, as less than a minute later, Hall broke free again. This time, the Marauders’ running back took the ball down his own sideline, then cut back across the field and crossed the same goal-line he crossed on the previous drive. His second touchdown of the game, from 74 yards out, put Dunkirk ahead 13-6, as the extra point was blocked.

Then came the ensuing kickoff.

Looking back to a year ago, not only did Dunkirk’s regular season end on a sour note, its consolation game also had a rough finish. McCracken took a violent hit during a game against Lake Shore to end the season, which prompted several Dunkirk players to come to her defense.

This year, in what could be her final game after two years of keeping Dunkirk’s tradition of welcoming female kickers into the program, McCracken flipped the script.

McCraken kicked off following her blocked extra-point attempt, and the Fredonia kick return unit parted the Marauders’ coverage. As the ball carrier took off down the field, McCracken was left as the last line of defense.

The rest is history.

“It’s her senior moment,” Gomez said.

McCracken made the tackle at the Dunkirk 40-yard line to preserve Dunkirk’s lead. From there, the Marauders held Fredonia scoreless for the rest of the first half and never surrendered the lead. Fredonia never took a snap on offense without facing a deficit thanks to McCracken’s touchdown-saving tackle.

“Lauryn McCracken came up and made a huge hit. That’s huge,” Gomez said. “… She was the hammer, not the nail this time.”

McCracken had her senior moment in the first half. So did plenty of other Marauders.

Halfway through the second quarter, quarterback Gabe Valentine had his own highlight reel moment. Facing a fourth down at midfield, Valentine scrambled for the first down, but he didn’t stop there. Fredonia’s defense could not corral the Dunkirk quarterback, as Valentine dashed to the Dunkirk sideline and down the field for a 50-yard touchdown. It was Dunkirk’s third touchdown of more than 45 yards at the time, which gave the visitors a 19-6 lead.

That wasn’t enough for Dunkirk.

The Marauders extended their lead with yet another improbable touchdown, Jaylen McMichael took a pitch on an end-around, then lobbed the ball high into the air toward the middle of the field. Normally, that wouldn’t be a good idea, but Jareese Gaines doesn’t follow the rules of normalcy when the ball is in the air. Gaines came down with the jump ball, broke a tackle, and weaved through the open territory in Fredonia’s secondary on his way to a 70-yard touchdown. The Marauders led 26-6 at halftime.

In the third quarter, following a Gullo injury, Fredonia turned to Ayden Wronski in the backfield. The new Hillbillies running back scored two touchdowns, followed by a 2-point conversion with each run, to put Fredonia within 10 points heading to the fourth quarter, 32-22.

“I thought we had great senior leadership throughout the game to get us back in it,” Fredonia head coach Greg Sherlock said. “Even from some of the underclassmen, like Wronski, who ran well.”

But the fourth quarter belonged to Dunkirk. Offensively, it was all Hall in the final frame, with two more touchdown runs, first from 30 yards to extend the lead to 38-22, then to pile it on with 2:30 to go from 49 yards out.

Defensively, Dunkirk’s secondary stepped up in closing time. Key pass breakups by Liam McQuiggan and McMichael turned the ball over on downs and helped the Marauders seal the victory.

“We’ve been battling for years. It feels good in my last time to win the game,” Hall said. “… Knowing this is my last time playing with the boys and we got the win, in one of the biggest rivalries, it just feels great.”

For Fredonia, Friday marked the end of the careers of several key players in recent years, including Ian Storey, Colin Crowell, Bryce Bacher and Luca Gullo, among others. “I’m truly going to miss those kids,” Sherlock said. “They’ve been on those teams at the stadium. You have no idea what they’ve given to this team.”

But for Dunkirk, while a lot changed in a year, one thing stayed the same: Gomez still left the field with a soaked shirt. This time, instead of from the rain, it was from a cooler dumped over his back by his players in a celebration.

Both teams missed out on the postseason this year with losing records in the regular season, and there is still a possibility either team could wind up playing a consolation game to end the year. That will be determined later.

What was determined Friday night was that Dunkirk got to spend a night atop the rivalry throne, and this time, they got to keep the hardware that comes with it.