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Covering suburban Philadelphia's high school sports scene.

Saturday, November 10, 2007

Soudy gets flagged

A dirty little secret was exposed in Souderton's loss to Downingtown East in the opening round of the district playoffs.

Penalties.

The Indians have been so dominant all year, overlooked has been the fact they've averaged nearly six penalties per game. That's not an extraordinarily high number, but it's more than Quakertown and Central Bucks West (four per game each) -- whose combined record is 3-18. It's almost twice as many as North Penn.

On Friday, Souderton was flagged nine times, including twice on the Cougars' game-winning drive.

Souderton coach Ed Gallagher, emotional after the defeat, wasn't happy with the officials. In fact, he'd had issues with the same crew in two previous games, which Souderton won.

Nonetheless, penalties alone didn't cost Souderton -- and plenty of good teams absorb penalties. The offense couldn't sustain drives on Friday, particularly in the second half. A running attack that averaged 280 yards per game produced just 95 yards on 41 carries against Downingtown. There was also a missed extra point.

And there was the fact Downingtown just kept hanging around. Although the Cougars truly seemed out of it at times, and Souderton simply felt destined to win this one, the Indians couldn't ever deliver that final knockout blow.

"I started getting an eerie feeling as the game went on," Gallagher said. "I can't explain it, but I think they wanted this more than we did."

-C.D.

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