FAIRBORN – Greenville defeated the Fairborn Skyhawks 29-26 in a Friday night MVL road win improving the Green Wave’s varsity football season record to 3-1 on a humid September night with many players playing both sides of the ball.
“Our group of kids is one of the toughest I’ve ever been around,” said Greenville coach Bart Schmitz following the win. “They have worked their tails off. There is a reason why nobody has to come out of a game late in games. It’s because they work their tails off in practices and we’re in great shape.”
Greenville jumped out to a 7-0 first quarter lead taking advantage of an 8-yard touchdown pass from Tyler Beyke to John Butsch to complete a 63-yard six play drive with 9:28 showing on the clock.
The big play of the scoring drive came on the third play of the night with Marcus wood scampering 41-yards from the Greenville 45-yard stripe down to the Fairborn 14-yard line.
Ethan Flanery capped the drive splitting the uprights out of the hold of Beyke to give Greenville a 7-0 lead after one period of play.
Senior quarterback Tyler Beyke used the Wave’s second six play scoring drive of the night, a 1-yard quarterback keeper up the middle at 10:21 in second quarter action to make it a 13-0 Greenville lead.
Conner Mills carried for the 2-point conversion play to push Greenville’s lead to 15-0.
The Skyhawks battled back to score on a 12-play 66-yard drive at 4:01 in the second period and a 55-yard 5-play drive with 00:57 on the second quarter clock. Fairborn’s first PAT kick was good but a solid Greenville defensive stand on the Skyhawks 2-point second TD conversion attempt was stopped short sending the teams to the break with Greenville clinging to a 2-point advantage.
“We challenged these kids at the half,” said Coach Schmitz. “I didn’t think we played a very good first half, things weren’t going our way and we challenged them. These kids – everything that we ask them to do, they do.”
Greenville pushed its lead back to 9-points late in third period play with Tyler Beyke scoring by way of a quarterback keeper from 1-yard.
The 1-yard Beyke score was set up with the Wave facing third-and-seven at the Fairborn 23-yard line and Beyke hitting Butsch with a 22-yard strike to the Skyhawks 1-yard line.
With Flanery drilling the PAT kick through the posts, the Wave owned a 22-13 lead.
Fairborn stormed back with an early fourth quarter touchdown, but once again had its 2-point conversion attempt stopped by the Green Wave making a 22-19 Greenville lead with 11:19 on the game clock.
Greenville orchestrated a 10-play 73-yard touchdown drive taking 5:14 off the game clock with a Beyke to Alec Fletcher 5-yard strike. Flanery’s PAT sailed through the uprights giving Greenville a double digit 29-19 lead with 6:05 remaining in the contest.
A Beyke quarterback keeper on the drive’s first play from scrimmage had the Wave senior racing 31-yards from Greenville’s 27 to the Fairborn 42-yard line to set up the 10-play TD drive.
“Right after Fairborn scored – they cut it to three and we put the ball right back in his (Beyke) hands and off he goes,” Schmitz said with a smile.
Facing a second-and-15 on its next possession following the Wave’s TD, Greenville’s DJ Zimmer picked up a huge sack getting a handful of jersey and slinging the Skyhawks’ QB for a 10-yard loss putting the home team in a third-and-25 hole.
“That was big,” said Coach Schmitz, “That was a huge sack – really put them in a hole.”
Fairborn held Greenville to a three and out setting up the Skyhawks final drive of the night.
With time winding down, Fairborn put together one final scoring drive, a 9-play 72-yard drive to trail 29-26 and 1:45 left on the game clock.
Greenville was ready for Fairborn’s desperation onside kick attempt with the Wave taking control of the ball. Out of timeouts, the Skyhawks could only watch as Beyke would take back-to-back ‘kneel downs’ to run out the clock and give Greenville the MVL win improve to 3-1 on the season.
Greenville had a total of 287-yard on 58-plays while Fairborn was close behind with a total of 280-yards coming on 55-plays.
Fairborn had 138-rushing yards on 25-carries; Greenville 111-yards on 34-carries.
Greenville won the battle of the air with Beyke passing for 176-yards hitting an impressive 19/24 with 1-interception on a controversial call. Fairborn was 13-30 for a total of 142-yards through the air.
“His leadership and the way that he runs the offense – I could tell him that I want this and it’s exactly the way that we want it,” Coach Schmitz said of Beyke. “He has doing a fabulous job of staying calm and running this offense the way that it needs to be run. When we want to go fast we can go fast. When we need to eat up the clock we can eat up the clock. It’s a complement to him and what he can do.”
Beyke led the Wave in rushing with 68-yards on 22-carries. John Butsch paced Greenville with 61-receiving yards on 5-receptions, Alec Fletcher 46-yards on 4-catches, Marcus Wood 7-receptions for 43-yards and Ethan Flanery 2-catches good for 26-yards.
“We had numerous kids step up tonight,” Schmitz noted. “Marcus Wood, John Butsch, Alec Fletcher – they all stepped up with big catches.”
On the defensive side, Connor Mills had 8-tackles, John Butsch 6-tackles, Haydn Sharp 5-tackles and Carter Elliot 4-tackles to lead the Wave.
“Our defense got enough stops and that is all you can ask for,” concluded Schmitz. “Anytime you can end with a win, I don’t care what it looks like – a win is a win.”
