It could have gone horribly wrong.

The snap got away from Newburgh Free Academy quarterback Amarri Tice. Instead of falling on it, he picked it up.

“I just took the chance,” Tice said. “It was a lucky bounce. I thought somebody was behind me. I didn’t want them to hit me as I was falling down, so I tried to grab it.”

It still could have been a huge loss of yardage, but Syncere Tatum helped bail his team out of trouble.

“When I saw him, I just pointed up and he threw it up and I just happened to catch it,” Tatum said.

He caught it despite the wobbling pant resembled a lopsided punt more than a crisp pass, but Tatum won the jump ball.

“(Tice) He just made a play,” Newburgh coach Bill Bianco said. “Syncere too. That was a tough catch he made. I’m just happy it worked out. Sometimes it goes the other way. We got lucky there.”

The Goldbacks were able to capitalize as a few plays later, Tatum was in the end zone and the Goldbacks were on their way to a 40-27 win over the Valley Central Vikings.

“We knew VC wasn’t a bad team coming into this week,” Tatum said. “We executed and got the job done.”

Tatum was named the player of the game for the Goldbacks, running for 152 yards on 11 carries and two rushing touchdowns. He also caught a touchdown pass from Tice.

“We put it on for the youth,” Tatum said. “That’s what Coach B(ianco) told us, to put on a show for our crowd and our city.”

Tice got off to a rough start as he was intercepted by Valley Central’s Randy Rosario in the first quarter for the Vikings’ first touchdown.

“He threw the ball great all night, but just that one,” Bianco said.

“You take away that and you take away the one on the (second team) – we’re trying to get everyone in – maybe the score’s not what it was. They’re much improved so I’m happy with the win.”

After Tatum tied the game with his first touchdown – a 40-yard scoring run, Tice threw his first of three touchdown passes, a 20-yard strike to Nick Patterson gave the Goldbacks (2-0, 1-0 Class AA) a 13-7 lead.

“As a backup, I got to see the game more and learn stuff that I might not have learned if I played last year,” Tice said. “This year, I’ve been working, and the coaches picked up that I could throw the ball.”

Tice also threw touchdown passes to Kendall Scott and Tatum. Scott also scored on a 1-yard touchdown run.

“We always try to build what we’ve got to the kids we’ve got,” Bianco said. “Obviously Amarri can throw the ball a little bit and we’ve got a couple of receivers we like. We try to be a little more balanced if we can.”

The Vikings found a measure of success through the air as quarterback Nate Depew threw two touchdown passes. He connected with Connor Fitzgibbons late in the second quarter to pull the Vikings to within 5 points, 19-14, and then Gino Lucas on a 10-yard touchdown pass in the fourth quarter.

Depew also found a hole in the Newburgh defense with his legs, scoring on a 69-yard run in the fourth quarter.

“We did some good things, but there’s always things you have to clean up,” Bianco said.
Newburgh will have some extra time to clean things up and make some new installations as they have a bye before hosting Washingtonville on Sept. 27.

“We’ll use this week to correct the mistakes and work on some things we think can help us,” Bianco said.