Monday, Oct. 13, 2014: Iona Prep defeats No. 3 St. Anthony's

   Leading off today: Qaadir Sheppard caught three touchdown passes on offense and registered three sacks at defensive end Sunday as No. 21 Iona Prep toppled No. 3 St. Anthony's 40-30 in a CHSFL football game between state-ranked large schools.

   Gaels quarterback Robert Madison was 32-for-48 for 394 yards and five touchdowns, including the three to Sheppard (11 catches, 157 yards).

   St. Anthony's was without star running back Jordan Gowins, resting an injured hamstring, and the Friars couldn't protect QB Steven Genova, who was sacked eight times. The Friars' Evan Killen rushed for 93 yards and three TDs.

   "I thought they exposed us with some of the secondary stuff," St. Anthony's coach Rich Reichert told Newsday. "(Sheppard) was a mismatch for us. We'll figure it out and hopefully we can play them again and figure some things out."

   A change at UB: The University at Buffalo fired football coach Jeff Quinn on Monday, two days after a 37-27 loss to an awful Eastern Michigan team.

   Quinn was 3-4 in his fifth season and just 20-36 overall since arriving from his role as an assistant at Cincinnati, but the Bulls were 8-5 in 2013 and seemed to be making strides toward improvement before the 2014 woes that included a loss to Army.

   The timing of the firing -- UB has a bye coming up Saturday -- gives interim coach Alex Wood, the team's offensive coordinator, additional time to prepare.

   Though Quinn received a five-year extension in January 2013 to give prospective recruits a sense of confidence that the coaches would be there for the long haul, The Buffalo News reported the buyout will only be in the neighborhood of $325,000.

    Brandon Smiley, a receiver at Sweet Home, is the only New York senior known to have made a non-binding verbal commitment to UB thus far.

   Keep off the grass: Just a few weeks after the football field was infested with grubs and closed briefly for treatment, Saratoga's soccer field has been shut down for repairs as well, The Daily Gazette reported over the weekend.

   The girls varsity soccer team had to relocate a game Thursday but could be back on school grounds in time for sectionals. The culprit is settling dirt following work last fall to lay down a new sprinkler system.

   "We just kind of noticed, probably around the beginning of October, these dirt patches and they were starting to get deeper by the day," coach Adrienne Dannehy told the paper. "One day we noticed a sprinkler head sticking up

RoadToSyracuse.com football site

Many reporters use Twitter to deliver remote updates. We track those tweets from a variety of venues 24/7. Visit the page to see what's going on.

out of the ground and we decided it was just unsafe."

   Dreams vs. reality: For parents who think their sports-playing children are destined to reel in college scholarship money, CNBC wrote this Monday:

   "The odds of landing a college scholarship in many major sports are lower than the chances of being admitted to Harvard, Yale, Princeton or Stanford."

   On the plus side, the network reported colleges and universities awarded more than $3 billion in athletic scholarships in 2013, even though relatively few of the grants came in the form of full rides. In 2013, the average amount awarded to NCAA Division I athletes was $13,821 for men and $14,660 for women.

   There's plenty more interesting information in the story.

   Extra points: Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake appointed Mark Tooker as the new boys basketball coach. Tooker, a physical education teacher in the district for 18 years, coached the JVs from 1997-2005 and again in 2007.

   Josh Peck has been named boys basketball coach at Mohonasen following 11 seasons with the boys and girls teams at The King's School in Bolton, Conn., and two seasons out of sports after arriving at the Section 2 school. He replaces Ken Dagostino.

   When Shenendehowa's Julia Samson swam a winning 58.34 seconds in the 100-yard butterfly last week, it gave the junior the top Section 2 in seven of eight individual events this season.