Boyertown can’t hold early lead, loses to winless Norristown

Chris Carter threw four second-half touchdowns to lift winless Norristown over visiting Boyertown 33-28 Friday in a PAC-10 Liberty finale, damaging the Bears’ playoff hopes.

Boyertown (1-4, 3-6) led 21-0 in the opening minute of the second quarter before seeing the Eagles (1-4, 1-8) rattle off five unanswered touchdowns.

Carter’s 35-yard TD to Julian Arthur gave Norristown the lead for good at 27-21 with 8:35 remaining. The Eagles added another score, on a Carter-to-Arthur pass from 12 yards out, to go up 33-21.

The Bears got a Luke Ordway touchdown catch with 2:44 remaining, and got the ball back with 1:27 left after stopping the Eagles on downs. Anthony Panarello threw three straight incompletions before being sacked on fourth down to end their final chance.

Carter completed 9-of-15 passes for 115 yards, with TD passes of 4 and 19 yards to Johnny Dinolfi. Arthur had five receptions for 86 yards.

Norristown out-gained Boyertown 257-157.

The Eagles gained just 142 rushing yards, on 47 attempts, as the Bears recorded 12 tackles for loss. Ordway had 14 tackles for Boyertown, seven for loss. He also forced a fumble.

Roman Marinello rushed for 70 yards and Leo Egbe for 62 for Boyertown; Egbe scored on runs of 3 and 1 yards in the first quarter. Cole Yesavage’s 2-yard run put the Bears up 21-0 with 11:22 remaining in the first half.

Boyertown was in position for an Eastern Conference playoff berth entering the game.

The Bears end their regular season next week with a crossover game against a Frontier Division opponent.

The 33 points are a season high for Norristown, which snapped a 10-game losing streak. The Eagles went 1-3 in the spring playing in the United X League, losing their final three.