Fairy tale? Upset? Call it what you want, but Eagles are District 3 champs

The temperature hovered near freezing. The wind relentlessly whipped across the field. Exeter quarterback Colin Payne felt right at home.

As a kid he used to go out in the snow and the rain and throw the football around, preparing for a night such as this.

When it came he and his Eagles teammates were ready, rallying for a stunning 31-28 victory over Gov. Mifflin Friday in the District 3 Class 5A championship game at Mifflin Stadium.

“We know we’re a special group,” Payne said after the Eagles knocked out the top-ranked team in the state. “We knew we could be the only team that could beat these guys.”

Seven weeks after his team was beaten by 33 points by the Mustangs Payne stood tall in the pocket, ignored a heavy rush and threw three touchdown passes.

On the game-sealing drive that saw the seventh-seeded Eagles (10-3) run out the final 7 1/2 minutes of the clock he made big play after big play. He opened the drive with an 11-yard run, scrambling out of the pocket when he couldn’t find an open receiver.

On a critical fourth-and-4 at the Mifflin 38 with three minutes left he waited patiently in the pocket, then found his top target, Joey Schlaffer right at the sticks to maintain possession.

A minute later, on a third-and-4, with just under two minutes left, he drilled a pass over the middle to J.R. Strauss, essentially clinching the biggest win in Exeter’s 64-year football history.

After that Payne knelt down twice. When he stood up the Eagles were district champions for the first time.

“He came into his own tonight,” said Exeter coach Matt Bauer after watching Payne ignore the elements and complete 13-of-21 passes for 161 yards. “He stood in there and took some shots and he put the ball right on the money.”

“He was throwing balls on the dime, hitting everyone,” said Strauss.

Exeter (10-3) advances to the PIAA semifinals next week against the District 7 champ, either Moon or Penn-Trafford; those teams play Saturday night.

First, though, they’ll bask in this victory — easily one of the greatest upsets in Berks football history — for a little while.

“This is amazing,” said junior guard Lucas Palange, part of an offensive line that controlled the game. “I’ve never felt anything like this. A lot of people didn’t expect this to happen.”

Bauer called it a “fairy tale,” seeing as how his team fell behind 30-0 in the first meeting with the Mustangs (10-1), a game which they lost 54-21, at home.

The Eagles coach has no trouble if people look at this as an upset.

“I don’t care how they look at it,” he said during a euphoric post-game celebration, “we’re coming home with the hardware.”

Magical as this result seems to many, Bauer’s players don’t look at it like that. Maybe that’s why they were able to take down a powerhouse team such as the Mustangs.

That first game? Not a factor, said senior running back Eric Nangle, who carried it 40 times for 221 yards and gave the Eagles the lead for good with a 31-yard TD run with 9:15 left.

“We’re a whole new team,” he said.

That was the feeling across the board. The Eagles took some tough defeats during the regular season, learned from them, and went about getting better. They were a different team once the postseason began. They blasted second-seeded Manheim Central on its home field. Slugged it out against old nemesis Cedar Cliff, emerging with a 42-35 semifinal victory.

They seemingly lost momentum after a great first half and fell behind 28-21 after the Mustangs scored on their first two third-quarter possessions. They found a way to regain it, pouncing when the Mustangs fumbled away a kickoff with 10:40 left.

“We just had to rally back,” Palange said. “The team came together and we started making some big plays at some big times.”

Mifflin took its first lead at 28-21 when Eden Johnson broke free on a 28-yard run with 7:26 remaining in the third quarter. Those final 17 1/2 minutes, though, the Eagles owned. Completely.

They controlled the ball for 8 1/2 minutes on a drive that ended with a field goal that cut Mifflin’s lead to 28-24. The next time they touched it they went ahead when Nangle appeared to be stopped at the line but somehow pulled out of the pile and reached the end zone. After the Mustangs went three-and-out and punted it away it was essentially game over.

The Eagles, with Nangle following the lead of tackles Anthony Caccese and Sam Orzolek, guards Kyle Lash and Palange, and center Kyle Helm, maintained the ball for the final 7:35 of the game.

“We just came out, played our ball and stood our ground,” said Palange.

The win was just the second over the Mustangs in the last 15 years. The Eagles have played second fiddle to them for forever. Not this time.

“We’ve had some horrible nights on this field, let’s face it,” said Bauer. “To be able to to come out here and win a district championship . . . you can’t script it any better.”

	1	2	3	4	Final
Exeter	7	14	3	7	31
Gov. Mifflin	7	7	14	0	28

Scoring summary

1	Exeter	Schlaffer, 4 pass from Payne (Moser kick)	8:18
1	Gov. Mifflin	Singleton, 51 pass from Johnson (Schools kick)	7:24
2	Exeter	Schlaffer, 15 pass from Payne (Moser kick)	7:52
2	Exeter	Nangle, 33 pass from Payne (Moser kick)	6:38
2	Gov. Mifflin	Johnson, 9 run (Schools kick)	1:26
3	Gov. Mifflin	Singleton, 2 run (Schools kick)	8:32
3	Gov. Mifflin	Johnson, 28 run (Schools kick)	7:26
3	Exeter	Moser, 23 FG	10:53
4	Exeter	Nangle, 31 run (Moser kick)	9:15

Team statistics

	Exeter	Gov. Mifflin
First downs	23	9
Rushes-yards	48-237	26-154
Passing yards	161	71
Total yards	398	225
Passes	13-21-1	2-3-0
Fumbles-lost	1-0	3-2
Punts-average	2-3.0	2-35.5
Penalties-yards	8-62	8-60

Individual statistics

RUSHING

Exeter: Nangle 41-224, Payne 2-10, Yocum 3-5.

Gov. Mifflin: Johnson 8-62, Singleton 8-40, Gallen 5-19, Rock 2-16, Martin 1-5.

PASSING

Exeter: Payne 13-21-1–161.

Gov. Mifflin: Johnson 2-3-0–70.

RECEIVING

Exeter: Schlaffer 5-55, Strauss 4-49, Nangle 2-36, Yocum 2-21.

Gov. Mifflin: Singleton 1-51, Rock 1-20.

INTERCEPTIONS

Gov. Mifflin: Johnson.