Friday football roundup: Winnacunnet scores first touchdown of season in loss to Memorial
The third week of the high school football season continued on Friday with seven games involving Seacoast teams.
Exeter kicked off the week with a 31-6 win at Spaulding on Thursday, while Friday's highlight game was Portsmouth/Oyster River pulling out a 24-22 win over Dover.
In other action, Winnacunnet hosted Memorial in Division I, St. Thomas Aquinas hosted Sanborn in Division II, and Somersworth, the two-time defending Division IV state champion opened its season at home against Mascoma Valley.
In Maine, York hosted Leavitt in a Class C game, Marshwood traveled to Gorham in Class B, and Traip Academy visited Maranacook Valley.
Here's a look at Friday's games.
Manchester Memorial 32, Winnacunnet 11
HAMPTON – The Winnacunnet High School football team hosted Manchester Memorial on Friday at Alumni Field in the third week of the season.
The Warriors scored their first points of the season, held their first lead, and went into halftime confident despite trailing by three points.
Any momentum the Warriors may have had in the first 24 minutes of the game, was quickly erased in the first two-plus minutes of the second half.
Not only did Memorial return the opening kickoff of the second half for a touchdown, Winnacunnet fumbled the ensuing kickoff and Memorial gained possession at the Warrior 21-yard line.
Five plays later, senior quarterback Connor McFarland connected with junior Collin Beaulieu for an 8-yard scoring strike.
And just like that, a 6-3 lead by Memorial at halftime, was now 19-3 with 9:22 left in the third quarter.
“Those 2 minutes pretty much decided the game,” Winnacunnet head coach Ryan Francoeur said. “We, obviously, were going to keep battling, but we knew coming into the week that Memorial was a good opponent, and if we let them hang around they were going to play better and better.”
The Crusaders, after the quick two scores, scored on their next possession as McFarland, on fourth-and-6, ran the ball in from 8 yards out, giving Memorial a 26-3 lead with 4:30 left in the third.
“We just had a quarter there that we would love to have back,” Francoeur said. “But overall I thought the kids battled hard all night.”
Key plays: The Warriors took the opening kickoff and marched 76 yards on 17 plays, ending with Elias Spalding’s 22-yard field goal with 4:53 left in the first quarter. The field goal marked Winnacunnet's first points of the season.
The Warriors scored their first touchdown of the season with 2:40 left in the game on junior DJ Sciacca’s 7-yard run. The drive took just three plays and covered 41 yards.
On the second play, Mason McDonald, filling in for quarterback Riley McDaniel for a play, connected with Jake Magri on a 28-yard pass, giving the Warriors a first down at the 7. McDonald then hooked up with Logan Brown on the successful two-point conversion, cutting the Memorial lead to 26-11.
After Sciacca’s touchdown, Memorial answered on Erik Seymore’s 50-yard run, giving the Crusaders a 32-11 lead with 2:25 left.
On Winnacunnet's second drive of the night, junior Logan Lochiatto hauled in an acrobatic 17-yard pass on third down, giving the Warriors a first down on the Memorial 40. Lochiatto stretched, and tipped a McDaniel pass with his left hand. The ball then went off his helmet, off his shoulder, and trickled behind his back before Lochiatto was somehow able to secure the ball behind his back and bring it around to his chest as he was falling to the ground.
"That was a great catch by (Lochiatto) there," Francoeur said.
McDaniel ran for 50 yards and threw for 51. Magri had four catches for 66 yards, and McDonald ran for 67 yards on 17 carries. Memorial's Seymore rushed for 107 yards on 12 carries.
-Jay Pinsonnault
Leavitt 63, York 13
YORK, Maine - York gave Leavitt a scare early on, but the Hornets put the pedal down late in the first quarter and never looked back on its way to a dominant victory.
Leavitt (3-0) took advantage of early York (1-2) turnovers, and weathered a quick flurry that saw York cut the lead to 21-13 before rolling through the rest of the game.
Although the game didn’t go the way that coach Matt Nelson hoped, he said he was proud of the fight his team showed, and felt there were some things to build off. The Wildcats had two starting offensive linemen, including their starting center.
Coach’s comment: “A lot of people are going to have trouble with Leavitt,” Nelson said. “They are a very good team. But we all have to do better. Coaches have to do better. We have to play better. We have to practice better. This happened. Good teams have to forget it and move on. That’s what we’re going to do, move on. We had some things we can build on. I was really happy with our kickoff return – they stopped kicking to our return guys. And Benny Brown played a great game for us.”
Key moments: After Brody Gullison returned the opening kickoff to the York 40, the Wildcat offense went backwards with a pair of incompletions followed by a 12-yard sack. On fourth down things got even worse when an errant snap on the punt got away and Leavitt took over at the York 3.
The Hornets immediately cashed in on quarterback Noah Carpenter's 3-yard touchdown run. York trailed 21-0 early in the second quarter, when it marched down the field and scored on an 8-yard touchdown pass from Peter Martin to Ben Brown. On the ensuing kickoff, Brown stripped Leavitt kick returner Mason Henderson of the ball, then recovered the fumble and ran it in for a touchdown.
Key players: Brown stood out on a tough night for the Wildcats, hauling in six catches for 74 yards and a touchdown. He also had five tackles.
With starters resting in the second half, backup quarterback Alexander Taylor came in and sparked the Wildcats with some big plays including runs of 12 and 15 yards, and a 20-yard pass play. Starting quarterback Peter Martin finished the night 8-for-19 for 99 yards, a touchdown and an interception, before ceding the ball to Taylor after halftime.
Up next: York will host Lisbon next Saturday at 2 p.m.
-Terrill Covey
Somersworth 50, Mascoma Valley 0
SOMERSWORTH – Tayshawn Sheppard scored four touchdowns, including three in the first half, to lead Somersworth in its season-opener.
Although it wasn’t intended to be an onside kick, Somersworth recovered its opening kickoff which eventually led to the game’s first TD, and the rout was on. The Hilltoppers scored on all five of their possessions in the first half and led 36-0 at the break.
Coach’s comment: “We’ve been talking about (how) we needed to find our identity all this preseason and I think they really embraced it today,” Somersworth coach Jeremy Lambert. “They embraced being an aggressive, attacking defense and offense. I was very impressed with the level of intensity and the focus that they brought. They showed what they were made of today.”
Highlights: Sheppard scored on runs of 4, 8, 32 and 59 yards. He also set up a short TD run in the first quarter by Kaden Bickford with a 52-yard scamper down the right sideline. Seth Worell and Aaron Delisle scored the other TDs for Somersworth in the second half.
The Hilltoppers were playing for a cause. Not only did their original opener get postponed until later in the season it was also the annual Moore Fight Moore Strong game in memory of Jessica Noonan Moore, a graduate of Somersworth High School and a former Hilltopper student-athlete who died of breast cancer in her mid-30s.
"It's been a long wait," Sheppard said. "We've been anxious since preseason really. Everyone was excited and ready to go. Not only is it our first game and our first home game it's Moore Fight Moore Strong so there are a lot of things to play for. That's all going through everybody's head and we're all playing for each other."
The players marked the occasion by wearing special blue, teal and pink uniforms with MFMS on the back.
“Everyone was emotional, the coaches and the kids,” Lambert said. “It meant a lot for what this game represents to do this for Jess and what she meant to this community. They’ve been amped up so when they finally got to go, they came out firing.”
-Al Pike
Marshwood 30, Gorham 27
GORHAM, Maine - Marshwood scored 10 points in the final 3:23 to come from behind to beat Gorham, 30-27, Friday night in Class B South action. Sophomore Brady Isabelle's 28-yard field goal with 31 seconds to play broke the tie and gave the Hawks the dramatic win.
"It was pretty wild," said coach Alex Rotsko. "We played from behind pretty much the entire game. We kept coming back. It was a good high school football game."
Down 27-20 with 4:55 to play in the fourth, the Hawks (2-1) tied it up on sophomore Graham Goodwin's 69-yard TD run at 3:23 and then classmate Isabelle won it with his first varsity field goal. Gorham drove the ball to the Marshwood 35 with seven seconds left, but a pass was broken up in the end zone as time expired. The Rams dropped to 0-3.
Marshwood trailed 14-13 at the half and 20-13 after three quarters. They tied it 20-20 early in the fourth quarter on a Tyler Hussey 20-yard scoring run, but the Rams went ahead with a TD with 4:55 to go.
Ryan Essex scored both of the Hawks' first-half TDs on runs of 4 and 5 yards. Shane Waterman and Dylan Grassi played well defensively
The Hawks are back in action next Friday at home against. Class A Sanford.
-Mike Whaley
St. Thomas Aquinas 15, Sanborn Regional 9
DOVER – St. Thomas Aquinas senior Sam Grondin recovered a fumble at the Saints’ 31-yard line midway through the fourth quarter, and STA ran out the remaining 6 minutes and 30 seconds for this Division II win.
The Saints ran 15 plays on the final drive, taking a knee on the final play.
“It was a great drive for our young line,” St. Thomas Aquinas head coach Ed McDonough said. “The kids ran hard, and that was a great way to end a tough game. The kids never quit. Sanborn is a tough team, they fought tooth and nail.”
Senior quarterback Mike Skowron’s scored on a 14-yard touchdown on the third play of the fourth quarter. Declan Healy then threw a two-point conversion pass, giving the Saints a 15-9 lead.
Trent Salyards rushed for 49 yards on nine carries for the Saints, while Timmy Avery had 48 yards on 11 carries and Skowron had 44 yards on six carries.
Salyards opened the scoring with a 79-yard interception return for a touchdown in the first quarter.
St. Thomas Aquinas is now 2-1 on the season, and will visit undefeated Kennett (3-0) next Saturday.
-Jay Pinsonnault
Maranacook Community 73, Traip Academy 0
READFIELD, Maine - Freshman xx Blanco rushed for 76 yards on three carries for Traip in this Maine 8-Man Small contest.
The Rangers are now 0-3 on the season.
"It was not our best effort," Traip head coach Eric Lane.
-Jay Pinsonnault
This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Friday football roundup: Seven games played involving Seacoast teams
