Weiser, Fleetwood will be on the defensive in Section 3 opener
2024 Berks football coverage
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A glance at the series history between Conrad Weiser and Fleetwood suggests one thing: Take the over.
When the Scouts and Tigers get on the field you can count on seeing the scoreboard go tilt. The teams have averaged more than 10 touchdowns and 63 points in their 15 meetings.
That might not be the case Friday night at Tigers Stadium.
Both teams have made it priority No. 1 this season to improve on defense, and they have.
The Scouts (3-0) have allowed just two TDs in three games and rank No. 3 in the Lancaster-Lebanon League in scoring defense, allowing 4.7 points per game. They’re No. 5 in total defense and No. 4 against the run.
The Tigers (2-1) haven’t been quite as consistent but they were very good last week in shutting down Schuylkill Valley in a 22-10 win. They allowed just nine first downs and 167 total yards against one of the best quarterbacks, Logan Nawrocki, and most potent offenses in Berks.
“It’s been a long, long time (since we defended that well),” said Fleetwood coach Steve Pangburn. “We let up a score with 19 seconds left in the first half (when) we got caught in the wrong coverage or we really would’ve had a special night.”
The Scouts have had a bunch of special nights. They got their first shutout, in a 41-0 win last week at Lebanon, since 2020. A week earlier, in a 31-7 win at Elco, the only score they allowed came in the final minutes after the second team offense turned the ball over deep in their own territory.
| SECTION 3 | League | Overall | PF | PA | |
| Weiser | 0-0 | 3-0 | 93 | 14 | |
| Fleetwood | 0-0 | 2-1 | 91 | 50 | |
| Garden Spot | 0-0 | 2-1 | 141 | 94 | |
| Solanco | 0-0 | 2-1 | 96 | 62 | |
| Man. Central | 0-0 | 1-2 | 38 | 74 | |
| Cocalico | 0-0 | 1-2 | 42 | 70 | |
| Warwick | 0-0 | 1-2 | 22 | 36 |
Otherwise the Scouts have looked like a completely different team on defense than the one that allowed more than 31 points per game last season.
They’re flying to the ball, playing as a unit and getting contributions from lots of different people. Defensive tackle Ashton Kiebach has three sacks and leads the team with 16 tackles; linebackers Davis Keppley, Gionni Messersmith, and Jonathan McQuillen and defensive end Jason Gechter each have 13 or more tackles.
“We have a lot of people around the ball all the time,” said Weiser coach Alan Moyer. “They’re really swarming to the ball. It’s been pretty remarkable.”
A slew of injuries knocked the Scouts down a peg last season and led to their 3-7 finish. The silver lining from that experience is that a lot of younger players got on the field, providing Moyer with a lot of depth coming into this season. He said he’s mixing in 14 different players on the first-team defense, helping key everyone fresh.
Only Evan Rittle, a wide receiver and safety, and Dylan Parr, a wide receiver and cornerback, are going both ways full-time. Gechter, Kiebach, and McQuillen are each seeing lots of time on both sides of the ball but Moyer has been able to give them breaks throughout the game.
That’ll help as the games get tougher now that Weiser is into its Lancaster-Lebanon League Section 3 schedule. The game against Fleetwood will mark the Scouts’ Section 3 debut; they played in Section 4 the last two seasons.
Fleetwood is one of just three teams returning to Section 3 this season after league-wide realignment. Section 3 has changed more than any other section, with Weiser and Cocalico moving up from Section 4 and Manheim Central and Warwick moving down from Section 2. Gone are Ephrata and Elizabethtown, to Section 2, and Daniel Boone and Twin Valley, to Section 4.
Garden Spot, which shared the Section 3 crown last year, was the preseason favorite and remains so. Manheim Central is off to a 1-2 start, but it’s Manheim Central; everyone still expects the Barons to make an impact in the section race.
Weiser and Fleetwood each believe they can move up and challenge the section leaders.
Moyer is looking forward to the league opener because it’ll give him a clearer indication of how much his team has progressed.
“This is gonna give us a little bit of a measuring stick of how good we are,” he said. “We’re 3-0, but I’m not sure we’re a 3-0 team because I don’t know who we’ve played yet.
“I think we’ll find out this week. Fleetwood, they’re big up front and they’ve got some talented kids that certainly can score any time they touch the ball. They’re gonna be tough.”
Pangburn will find out how far his defense come against a Scouts team led by three-year starting quarterback Donovan Gingrich and Rittle, an all-league receiver. The Tigers traditionally have not been able to stop Weiser, which has put up 50 or more points five times in the short series and averaged 42.8 over the 15 meetings.
The wildest game in the series came in 2021 when Weiser’s Logan Klitsch passed for 318 yards and three TDs and ran for four scores and 140 yards in a 52-38 victory.
Fleetwood got only its second win in the series last year, 30-21.
“We’re geared up for Weiser and we know they’re off to a great start,” Pangburn said. “Hopefully beating them last year puts the belief in us that we can do it.”
