Canandaigua rolls past Olympia/Odyssey to cap Class A2 regular season

By BOB CHAVEZ

CANANDAIGUA — It wasn’t exactly a meet and greet, but Thursday night’s football game between Canandaigua Academy and Greece Olympia/Odyssey essentially was an introduction for these teams.

Because the Gray Wolves and the Griffins are getting together again next week to do it all over again.

Of course, Canandaigua would love a repeat of its 42-28 victory. And of course, Olympia/Odyssey would love another shot to get it right.

Canandaigua (6-1) takes the No. 1 seed into next week’s Section V Class A2 playoff opener and will host the No. 8 Griffins (1-6). And even though Canandaigua controlled the pace and tone for much of Thursday night, there were signs from the Griffins that the Gray Wolves will take note of during film sessions this week. 

“They moved the ball and kept it from us,” Canandaigua coach Jeff Welch said. “They’re so compact and it’s tough to see how they played, but everyone has a specific job. So we’ll need to see where we made our mistakes.”

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There weren’t many of them in the first half. Sophomore Joel Lloyd took the opening kickoff 71 yards to the Olympia/Odyssey 14-yard line and four plays later, sophomore quarterback Austin Kierst took the ball in from four yards out for a lead Canandaigua would never surrender. 

And while the deceptive offense was no surprise for the Canandaigua defense, the passing game for the Griffins was. Junior quarterback Roberto Rodriguez hit senior Guy Haque-Minto on a couple of quick slants to move the Griffins to midfield before the drive stalled, thanks in large part to a sack by Canandaigua’s Aleks Hawryschuk, which turned a second-and-6 situation into a third-and-15 and two plays later, the Griffins were punting. 

Canandaigua’s ensuing drive started at its own 45 and the Gray Wolves drove with little resistance to the 12, where sophomore Brady Davern scooted in for his first varsity TD with 2:27 left in the first quarter. Longtime Canandaigua fans may recognize the Davern name as Brady’s father, Jim, was a leader for the Canandaigua team that won the 1999 state championship. 

Greece responded with a drive to the Canandaigua 20 as the first quarter ended and on the first play of the second, Juliun Carter hauled in a fourth-down pass for a touchdown. The missed extra point made it a 14-6 game but that didn’t last long. 

Canandaigua senior George Mirras returned the kickoff to the Greece 47 and three plays later, Kierst found Lloyd in stride for a 32-yard TD strike. 

Kierst added rushing TDs of three and seven yards before halftime, giving Canandaigua a 35-6 lead at the break. 

“We’ve been building every single week,” said Kierst, whose grandfather Butch played football at Canandaigua in the 1960s. “We were challenged by Fairport and Eastridge gave us a battle last week.”

The Griffins opened the second half with possession but punted away and the Gray Wolves scored their final TD when Hawryschuk broke free for a 38-yard scoring run to make it a 42-6 game. 

That opened the door for Canandaigua’s reserves to get some live reps and the Griffins scored three TDs down the stretch. Senior Jeremiah Lamberty ran it in from a yard out late in the third quarter, junior Andrew Wolff scored on a run with 3:37 left and a high snap on CA punt was recovered at the CA 14 to set up the final Greece TD, another run by Lamberty.

Greece coach Bob Cesarano is looking forward to the return trip to Canandaigua next week. He said the Griffins were limited by injuries that prompted unplanned exits on Thursday in addition to previous injuries that kept a couple of players from suiting up at all.

“Canandaigua is a very good team, and very physical,” he said. “But we had a few people who were not able to play. So hopefully we can get some guys back and give (Canandaigua) a good look next week.”

In Canandaigua, Welch was pleased with much of what he saw not only Thursday night, but in the two weeks following the loss to Fairport in Week 5. 

“We’ve improved,” he said. “A loss can be important if you come away with it learning a lesson and I think we’ve done that.”

As for knowing his team is playing the same team in consecutive weeks, he wasn’t too concerned about hiding offensive or defensive looks.

“If we execute, we can show what we want to show,” he said. 

Most of all, though, he was happy with the opportunity to get extensive reps for the younger players.

“They want to compete and they practice just as hard as everyone else,” he said. “So it was nice to get them out there and let them have some fun.”

Kierst led the Gray Wolves with 123 rushing yards and three TDs on 14 carries. Lloyd caught three passes for 58 yards, including the TD.