The pre-teen youth playoffs second round was played at North Providence High School last Sunday and the Johnston Pee-Wee Panthers were ready for the west Elmwood Intruders – the only team to beat them this year – with the winner earning the right to play the North End 49ers in the Super Bowl next Sunday. The Panthers (8-1) were trying to avenge their only loss of the season, which came three weeks ago at the hands of West Elmwood (8-1), 26-6. They gave the Intruders all they could handle and played very well this time around but came up on the short end of the score, 16-12. The first quarter started off good for the Panthers when Marc Conte ran for a 45-yard touchdown. He scored again on another nice run to give Johnston an early 12-0 lead. The Intruders bounced back with two touchdowns and two two-point conversions to make it 16-12 at halftime. The second half was a defensive struggle for the two co-division champs. West Elmwood got down to the Panthers 10-yard line but came away with no points as the Panthers defense played solid football. Johnston would take over and embark on a very good drive that used up a lot of clock time only to have a Conte touchdown called back on a penalty (West Elmwood also had a touchdown called back on a penalty in the first half on a kickoff return). The Intruders tried to run the clock out but Johnston’s Mike Marchetti recovered a fumble with 13 seconds and no timeouts remaining in the game. That gave the Panthers time for just two more plays but Conte was stopped at midfield to end the game. “The kids did a great job all year to get to this point,” said Johnston head coach Jason Wright. “You find out what a team is like when they get punched in the mouth and how they respond and we responded back. We had the Intruders on the ropes in the first half with a 12-0 lead. The Intruders have some good skilled players over there, you can’t take that away from them and they hit hard and clean. We have a great bunch of kids that worked very hard and I’m going to miss them during the off-season. They have nothing to be disappointed about and I am very proud of them all.” Coach Wright and his staff have done a great job with this squad all year. They made sure everyone got a chance to play and have taught them the fundamentals of the game very well. Eric Giorgio will be taking over the head coaching for the Pee-Wee’s next year as coach Wright moves up to the junior varsity, so the team will be in good hands.