Information for this story is courtesy of the Tri-County Sunday out of DuBois

ST. MARYS – Elk County Catholic went defensive to grab one of the two remaining District 9 Class A playoff berths with a 12-6 win over visiting Johnsonburg Friday night at Dutch Country Stadium in St. Marys.

The Crusaders (4-5) will be the No. 7 seed in the upcoming District 9 Class A playoffs and will travel to Clarion in the opening round in two weeks. The game is a rematch of last year’s semifinal contest won by the Bobcats (7-2) in double overtime at Brockway.

Johnsonburg (3-6), meanwhile, will be on the outside looking in when the postseason starts. The Rams could have clinched the seventh seed with a victory but instead find themselves in a tie with Redbank Valley (3-6) for the eighth spot. The Bulldogs, however, will end up with more District 9 Power Points than Johnsonburg and thus will get the eighth-and-final spot. Of course, nothing is official until the District 9 brackets come out sometime next week.

ECC, which as it turns out would have qualified for the postseason even with a loss, made sure it won’t be sitting on pins and needles waiting for other results by using a stingy defense and a strong running game.

The Crusaders limited Johnsonburg to 145 yards of total offense or 12 fewer yards than ECC’s Ricky Pearsall had. Pearsall ran for 157 yards, including a 65-yard touchdown run in the first quarter, on 26 carries.

Pearsall’s touchdown came with 5:28 left in the opening 12 minutes and tied the game at six. Johnsonburg had taken a 6-0 lead on a 17-yard Trey DeCecchis run.

The game remained deadlocked at six until early in the fourth quarter when Kyle Gerber scored what turned out to be the playoff clinching points on a 1-yard run with 10:13 left in the game. Gerber finished the night with 34 yards rushing on 10 carries.

Andy Nortum led Johnsonburg going 13 of 25 passing for 103 yards with Joe Holmberg catching five passes for 33 yards and DeCecchis four for 43. DeCecchis also ran three times for 21 yards.