Montclair wanted Pascack Valley again. It wanted the rematch. It had a “blackout” game this past Saturday. The atmosphere that it had tried to create in order to intimidate Pascack Valley failed, as the Indians pulled out the victory 20-13.

It was a coming out party for a couple of people on both sides of the ball for the Indians.  Senior running back, Andrew Flores had a day running the ball for the Indians, carrying the ball 18 times for 126 yards. Flores’s performance had parallels to that of Jorge Cortes, who last season rushed for 182 yards on 35 carries in last year’s win against the Mounties.

The Valley defense was much improved. Besides for the two passes that ended in touchdowns, the secondary tighten its coverages against the very speedy and athletic Montclair receivers. Junior Noah Baumgarten recorded two huge sacks for the Indians, including one in the 3rd quarter that set up a long third down for Montclair.

Mike Soravilla played another huge role for the Indians, this time on defense. His 45-yard interception after Baumgarten’s second sack was huge for the Indians giving the defense some life heading into the final 12 minutes of the game.

Once again, it came down to a fourth quarter drive for the Indians. In the almost same situation as against Hackensack, senior quarterback  Colin Dedrick hit one of the most clutch wide receivers in North Jersey, Mike Pimpinella (both are frequent topics of conversation on MSG Varsity’s weekly “Quick Hits” segment), again for a game-winning touchdown. This time, it was 10 yards further than the game-winner against Hackensack, 26 yards, but the result was the same, an Indians touchdown and an Indians victory.

The Indians swallowed their medicine twice on fourth downs inside the Montclair 30 as junior Matt Urrea hit 2 field goals, one from 28 yards and the other from 24 yards, a move not usually made by Pascack Valley.

Even though it was a road game and a far drive there was another good showing of students at the game on Saturday. Dubbed “The Valley Faithful” the students came out and supported their classmates and friends and helped the Indians to their second victory of the season.

The Indians have a week off after the long weekend and will get some much needed rest after two big games. The next game is the Homecoming game on Saturday, September 26 against West Milford a 1:00 p.m. kickoff.

Tempers flared in The Smoke Signal weekly predictions as Mr. Jasper beat his former student Mr. Morone. Jasper had his prediction at 28-20 and Morone had 28-21.

“Yeah that’s what happens when you bid $1 in the Showcase Showdown. He’s been watching a lot of Price Is Right it seems…I call shenanigans on him,” Morone said via direct message on Twitter.

Jasper gets a week off so he can watch film and study West Milford so he can make another spot on prediction in two weeks.

On the writers side of the predictions. Sport Show host Mike Zocco got the closest prediction and the original three of the sports staff (Calvin Ralph, Jake “The Snake”Aferiat, and Evan Jones) got the difference correct.

The standings are as follows:

1. Evan Jones (4 pts)
2. Mike Zocco (3 pts)
3. (Tied) Calvin Ralph, Jake Aferiat, and Claudia Ralph (1 pt)

This week also kicked off the The Smoke Signal Fantasy Football League’s season.

The matchup of the week went to Evan Jones vs. Calvin Ralph. Ralph pulled out the 2 point victory over Jones, 110-108. Matt Ryan (Ralph) and Sam Bradford (Jones) both had 33 points for their teams respectively.