FAIRFIELD — The Cony football team may have two quarterbacks, but the Rams only needed one of them Friday night.
Sophomore Riley Geyer threw four touchdown passes in a wonderfully efficient night of passing, leading Cony to a 37-20 win over Lawrence in a Pine Tree Conference Class B game at Keyes Field. Geyer completed 14 of 20 passes for 241 yards, including his final seven attempts of the second half, while also rushing for another 146 yards and a touchdown in the victory.
“I am pretty surprised. It’s not easy,” Geyer said of his monster numbers. “It’s a great feeling.”
Geyer’s 387 yards of total offense alone more than doubled Lawrence’s team total of 187 yards, helping Cony improve to 3-1 at the midpoint of the season. The Bulldogs dropped to 1-3.
Geyer’s big game came with the quarterback taking every snap for the Rams after the team entered the week having used both he and junior Dakota Andow under center over the first three weeks of the season. An injury during the week in practice in Cony’s receiving corps, in part, necessitated a move by Andow to that position to fill an existing void.
Not only did the move catch Lawrence by surprise, but Geyer delivered in the starring role.
“I think they’ve been using two quarterbacks, we were reading about that and we’ve seen both quarterbacks play,” Lawrence coach John Hersom said. “But (Geyer) tonight, his running and his throwing ability was pretty impressive.”
“Riley is the starter, but we know Dakota can go in,” Cony coach B.L. Lippert said. “Riley really came into his own a little bit here tonight. For a sophomore to come into this environment and throw for four (touchdowns) and run for one, he’s a pretty talented kid. We’ve got to put the ball in his hands.”
Senior wideout Reed Hopkins caught a pair of touchdowns, including one from 37 yards in the second quarter which gave Cony the lead for good at 14-7.
Seniors Matt Wozniak and Mike Wozniak also caught scoring passes from Geyer, who tossed touchdown throws of 19, 37, 30 and 11 yards — one of them in each quarter.
“We made a concerted effort to get the ball down the field a little more,” Lippert said. “We tried to take a little off his plate with the short-game stuff (earlier this season), and I thought (in a Week 3 loss to Skowhegan) we didn’t have enough in to go vertical. So we changed our philosophy a little bit that way, and we were able to hit them a couple of times deep.”
Geyer sealed the win with a 55-yard touchdown run with under two minutes remaining in the fourth quarter that built a 37-14 lead. That run answered a long, 14-play Lawrence drive midway through the period that ended with senior Kyle Carpenter’s second touchdown run of the night for the Bulldogs.
Cony’s defense was otherwise superb, particularly in the first half when it stopped two Lawrence drives inside the Rams’ 25-yard line. Cony’s Nic Mills fumbled the ball away on the game’s very first play from scrimmage, but the Bulldogs were stopped on fourth down on the ensuing possession.
“We gave them long fields, aside from the first play of the game,” Lippert said. “For the most part, they had long fields to work with all night and our defense does a really nice job. We might give up a big play or two, but it’s kind of bend but don’t break.”
Hopkins picked off Lawrence quarterback Dylan Coombs (6 of 9, 42 yards) in the end zone on fourth down, stopping a would-be second-quarter scoring drive for the Bulldogs that could have tied the game at 14-14.
“That was huge,” Hopkins said. “I probably could have just swatted it down, but I didn’t want to take chances, I guess. It got us going and fired the team up.”
Eleven plays and nearly five minutes later, sophomore Kyle Douin kicked a 21-yard field goal in the final seconds of the period to send the Rams into halftime with a 17-7 lead.
“They probably expected we were going to try to go to (receiver Isaiah Schooler) on that,” Hersom said of Hopkins’ interception. “That probably took some life out of us emotionally, but we’ve got to be resilient and keep fighting.”
Lawrence added a score when backup quarterback Nate Bickford connected with Zach Nickerson from five yards out as time expired in the final quarter.
Travis Barrett — 621-5621
tbarrett@centralmaine.com
Twitter: @TBarrettGWC
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