Genesee County Spartans’ defenders Ryley Elliott, Martin Krayna and Jack Fox-Salah try to break through against the Upstate Predators’ offensive line during Saturday night’s semipro football game at Pembroke Town Park. The Spartans lost, 52-14.
Photos by Lauren Donovan.
BY MIKE PETTINELLA
Genesee County Spartans
The Upstate Predators put together a dominant performance on both sides of the ball Saturday night, throttling the Genesee County Spartans, 52-14, in a Northeastern Football Alliance interdivisional game at Pembroke Town Park.
Quarterback Billy Joiner, a former receiver at the University of Buffalo, threw for five touchdown passes and ran for another to lead the Predators past the banged-up Spartans.
Upstate improved to 2-1 in the semipro league’s AAA Division while Spartans fell to 1-3 in the AA Division.
Delonta Curry brings down Upstate tight end Samuel Diaz. Diaz caught eight passes – three for touchdowns – in Upstate’s victory.
The Spartans entered the match with six starters – including standout defensive end Gunner Rapone and top wide receiver Deyonci Farley – out with injuries and then lost starting QB Corey Turpin to a broken collarbone suffered on his team’s opening drive.
The host team went to backup quarterback Alex Rood, who also left the game in the first half, and then to Robert Thurston Jr. and Jhzon Henderson behind center, with little success against the Rochester-based Predators’ stout defense.
Spartans’ wide receiver Robert Thurston Jr., pressed into action at quarterback, looks to pass as teammate Tim King looks on.
Genesee County’s two touchdowns came in spectacular fashion.
Their first TD occurred with 1:40 left in the first half on a kickoff return when Jzon Richardson took a lateral from Toast Malone and returned the ball 70 yards to the end zone, making the score 24-6.
The second came with 36 seconds left in the game when cornerback Keith Neureuter intercepted a pass and sprinted down the left sideline for a 100-yard TD.
Incidentally, Neureuter has the longest interception return in Pembroke High School history – 103 yards for a touchdown against Perry in his senior year of 2021.
The Spartans’ other points followed Richardson’s TD when Neureuter scooped up a bad snap on kicker Julia Petry’s point-after-touchdown attempt and just made it to the goal line.
(Pictured-Keith Neureuter after his 100-yard interception return.)
Incidentally, Neureuter has the longest interception return in Pembroke High School history – 103 yards for a touchdown against Perry in his senior year of 2021.
The Spartans’ other points followed Richardson’s TD when Neureuter scooped up a bad snap on kicker Julia Petry’s point-after-touchdown attempt and just made it to the goal line.
Other than that, it was all Predators – sparked by a pair of players in their early 30s – Joiner (19 of 23, 240 yards, five TD passes, and a touchdown run) and tight end Samuel Diaz of Dansville (eight receptions for 108 yards and three touchdowns).
“We’re playing well, and we expect to be in the championship game against Lockport,” said Joiner, who, like Diaz, has been playing for Upstate for four years.
Upstate lost at Lockport, 12-6, last week.
Diaz said he and Joiner are on the same page thanks to their time playing together and putting in extra work during the offseason.
“We took offseason seriously and got the chemistry right,” he said.
Wide receiver Tommy Love caught three passes, two of them for scores, while running back Cam Cleveland opened the scoring with a 1-yard TD run midway through the first quarter. Joiner’s 15-yard run as time expired in the first half gave Upstate a 32-8 lead at intermission.
Linebacker Darrius Fulton had three interceptions for the Predators.
The schedule doesn’t get any easier for the Spartans, who will travel to Lockport on June 28 to face the defending champion Wildcats, another AAA Division club.
Spartans Head Coach Harry Rascoe gave all the credit to the Predators while stating the significance of the season-ending injury to Turpin.
Turpin went into the game completing about 60 percent of his passes for 855 yards and eight TDs.
Rood, the backup, likely won’t be available as he gets set to play football at Geneva College in Western Pennsylvania.
“Looking at the score, 52-14, that’s a really good Predators’ team,” Rascoe said. “Losing our top two quarterbacks in the first half wasn’t ideal, but we stuck together. Now we’ve got to figure out who will play quarterback. It’s going to be a rough rest of the season.”