[9/18/04]It wasn’t pretty, but a win’s a win.

St. Aloysius quarterback Daniel Halinski’s poise in the passing game opened the field for Rob Jones’ three touchdowns as the Flashes beat Stringer 20-13 Friday night.

Despite seven fumbles only two of which were lost St. Al picked up its first win thanks to 12 penalties and five turnovers by Stringer. The Red Devils had a chance to tie with 27 seconds remaining, but Halinski came up big with an interception as time expired.

“We had enough plays for a highlight film, but we also had enough plays for a Bad News Bears’ film. That’s the way we were,” St. Al coach Jim Taylor said. “But I’ll tell you what, tonight was a giant step for us.”

The Red Devils (1-1, 0-1 Region 7-1A) bottled up the Flashes’ ground game early on, and St. Al (1-3, 1-1) was forced to move the ball through the air. Halinski responded by completing his first six passes of the game, and he finished 11-of-15 for 146 yards.

Jones finished with only 56 rushing yards on 18 carries, but he caught six passes for another 56 yards. With the Red Devils keyed on Jones, fullback Alex Halinski led the Flashes with 92 rushing yards on 14 carries.

“St. Al did a good job scheming our defense, and our guys have got a ways to go,” Stringer coach Tim Yeager said. “We learned something about character tonight.”

After a pair of first-half scores, the Flashes’ defense locked down in the second half and held the Red Devils scoreless. Stringer had 21 plays for 90 yards and three turnovers in the second half.

“We came in here 0-3, we’ve been outscored ridiculously,” Daniel Halinski said. “We came here tonight, they scored twice in the first half and that was it. It was big for our defense to step up. We finally started coming together.”

The game certainly didn’t start well for St. Aloysius.

On the first play from scrimmage, Stringer quarterback Charlie Fall broke several tackles and ran the ball 82 yards to the St. Al 3-yard line. Tailback Bryant Winfield then punched it in to put Stringer ahead 32 seconds into the game.

The Flashes then moved the ball to the Red Devils’ 1 before turning the ball over on downs. Starting at the 1, Stringer drove 99 yards in 11 plays helped by a fourth-down offsides penalty against St. Al. Josh Campbell finished the drive with a 1-yard TD for a 13-0 Stringer lead early in the second quarter.

“Once we got through the first quarter, we saw we could play and everybody got a positive attitude,” Taylor said. “We started playing hard and making plays on defense and offense.”

St. Al fought back with a 62-yard drive capped off by a 1-yard Jones score to cut the lead to 13-7 with 6:02 left in the half.

An interception by Harris Martin and a Stringer personal foul set up the Flashes at the Red Devils’ 25 with 17 seconds remaining before the break, but the Flashes fell short.

“We were moving the ball and basically the only time they stopped us was when we stopped ourselves with penalties or just busted assignments,” Taylor said of his team’s performance in the first half.

A pair of 15-yard penalties helped move St. Al’s offense forward at the start of the third quarter. But Stringer’s Campbell stripped the ball from Alex Halinksi at the 50. Six plays later, Campbell coughed it up on offense and St. Al’s Joseph Sudderth recovered.

On the ensuing drive, Alex Halinski ran 35 yards for the score, but a block in the back by Chip Donald brought it back. Jones carried it in from 15 yards on the following play for a 14-13 St. Al lead.

Donald atoned for his mistake by jumping Fall’s pass for an interception on the next drive. Daniel Halinski found Martin with a 36-yard floater to the Stringer 2. Jones finished it off two plays later from the 3 for his third touchdown as St. Al took a 20-13 lead with 10:54 left in the game.

The Flashes held the Red Devils on defense and milked the clock on offense, but they almost gave it away at the end.

Punter Jonathan Longmire had to fall on a bad punt snap, giving the ball to Stringer at the Flashes’ 46 with 26 seconds left. On third-and-9, two Flashes combined to sack Fall for a 15-yard loss.

But on fourth-and-24, Fall connected with Devin Brown on a 25-yard pass for a first down at the St. Al 35. Daniel Halinski then capped off his performance with an interception of Fall as time expired.