2008 Season


Shaughnessy	Burch

Shaughnessy, Burch, Winger

They're three of the best-known athletes to come out of Oil City, and the school honored two of them, first-team all-staters Jim Shaughnessy (football) and Dutch Burch (basketball) in 1996. The school has retired their numbers -- Shaughnessy's No. 68 in football and Burch's No. 36 in hoops. (Burch also starred in football for the Oilers.) The Derrick carried stories about both of them before they were honored. Read about them here:

Dutch Burch

Jim Shaughnessy

Winger

Meanwhile, three-time state champion Charlie Winger marked his 50th anniversary for winning the mile and 880 in 2005. Read about it here:

Charlie Winger

By the way, even though Burch and Winger starred in other sports, both played football for the Oilers.

Knights hold off Oilers, 14-12

Surprise, surprise.

It wasn't the pass-happy shootout that probably everyone expected.

Franklin ground out two rushing touchdowns and made them stand up in holding off Oil City, 14-12.

The difference was the PAT the Knights made after their second TD, a 41-yard run by Brandon Perrine with 4:34 left in the first half.

But Franklin got only 26 yards after intermission and Julian Wested, who is tied for the school lead in career TD passes with 29, tried only three passes in the game. (The Knights had been averaging 20 passes per game.)

And Tyler Bittner, who holds all the school receiving records, didn't make a catch from scrimmage.

The Oilers cut the lead to 14-12 on Sam Heasley's 6-yard TD run with 17 seconds left in the half. A pass off a trick play for the PAT failed.

Franklin took the second half kickoff, got a first down, but it was eventually forced to punt.

It was pretty much all Oil City on offense after that -- only trouble for the Oilers is they couldn't crack the end zone.

The Oilers reached the 7 the next time they had the ball, but fumbled.

After a three-and-out by the Knights, Oil City advanced to the 19, but was stopped on downs.

Oil City forced Franklin to punt again, and this time moved to the 30, where the Knights held on fourth-and-one with 1:49 left in the game.

Franklin went three-and-out again, and Brian Greenlee boomed a 40-yard punt to the Oil City 40 where the Oilers took over with a half-minute left.

Quarterback Stephen May connected with Logan Lantz with a 40-yard pass for an apparent first down on the Knights 25, but off-setting penalties wiped out the play.

The Oilers got off two more plays, the last one a pass from May to Ben Koyack that Bob Fazzolare batted away.

The Knights scored on their first possession, moving smartly down the field, all on running plays, with Sean Cogswell scoring from 18 yards out. Perrine's 20-yard run iginited the 80-yard march.

The Oilers answered with a 61-yard scoring drive that was capped by May's 1-yard run.

The Knights scored again on their second possession. Perrine broke a tackle near the line of scrimmage en route to his TD. Wested passed to Bittner for the conversion, giving the Knights a 14-6 advantage.

Again, Oil City answered with a scoring drive of its own with Heasley converting a fourth-down from the Franklin 22 with an 8-yard run.

May attempted 11 passes, completing three. The Oilers had been averaging 25 passes per game.

Oil City	0	12	0	0	12
Franklin	6	8	0	0	14

First Quarter

F -- Sean Cogswell 18, run (kick failed), 3:39

Second Quarter

OC -- Stephen May, 1, run (run failed), 7:17

F -- Brandon Perrine, 41, run (Tyler Bittner pass from Julian Wested), 4:34

OC -- Sam Heasley, 6, run (pass failed), 0:17

2008 Schedule
Aug. 30	at Meadville	L, 27-35
Sept. 5	Slippery Rock	L, 12-40
Sept. 12	Sharon	L, 6-28
Sept. 19	at Wilmington	L, 0-21
Sept. 26	Titusville	W, 31-29
Oct. 3	at Greenville	L, 14-35
Oct. 10	at Franklin	L, 12-14
Oct. 17	Eisenhower	7 p.m.
Oct. 24	Hickory	7 p.m.
Nov. 1	at Reynolds	1 p.m.