LYNN – Trailing by two touchdowns late within the third quarter Friday night time towards Winthrop, St. Mary’s of Lynn teammates bombarded freshman Maxwell Parent with phrases of encouragement when he fumbled within the crimson zone.
By the time Parent ran in his second landing of the fourth quarter to return again and tie the sport with 2:14 left to play, although, they didn’t must say a phrase to him as he ready to kick the go-ahead extra-point try.
He nailed it, capping off 15 unanswered factors the defending Div. 6 state champion Spartans (2-0) used to finish an exciting 15-14 comeback win over the Vikings (1-1) in nonleague motion. Defense performed an enormous function, forcing 4 signature turnovers and a fourth-quarter security to arrange the game-winning rating.
The win is the one hundredth for St. Mary’s head coach Sean Driscoll.
“I knew we always had it in us,” Parent mentioned. “We (knew) what we needed to do, and we just needed to execute. And we (knew) we could do it.”
“You saw a little test of wills, both ways,” Driscoll added. “There’s a resiliency with this football team, which is good. We’re excited.”
Winthrop’s Nick Cappuccio (140 complete yards, TD), Robert Rich (65 dashing yards) and George Galuris (46 dashing yards) have been terrors on the bottom at instances, serving to transfer the ball deep into St. Mary’s territory on nearly each possession within the first three quarters.
Pair that with a stingy defensive effort to maintain the Spartans off the board within the meantime, and it appeared the Vikings had full management over the sport, particularly when Parent fumbled the ball in a 14-0 recreation with underneath three minutes left within the third.
But simply because the protection did to pressure two Winthrop turnovers-on-downs within the crimson zone within the first half, St. Mary’s battled.
Cappuccio ran for a 32-yard acquire to get to midfield, just for the Spartans to get better a fumble on the following play. Parent (59 dashing yards) ran in a 7-yard rating to cap off a seven-play drive, and a failed conversion set the deficit at 14-6 with 11:09 to play.
On the following drive, Chris Marks’ sack pressured Winthrop to punt from its personal 23. A excessive snap despatched the punter by the again of the tip zone for a security, and a Vikings’ private foul on the kick return put St. Mary’s on the Winthrop 26 trailing simply 14-8 with 5:22 left.
“Once we settled into the game, we thought we had a good idea of what they wanted to do and what their strengths were, and I thought we took that away a little bit in the second half,” Driscoll mentioned. “First half, we struggled with some tackling, but other than that our defense played phenomenal.”
Winthrop’s protection didn’t make it simple from there, twice forcing the Spartans to transform on fourth down as St. Mary’s was 3-for-9 on third down within the recreation. Yaniel Belliard linked with Nicholas Marks on fourth-and-long to maintain the comeback alive, and Parent simply barely crossed the objective line on fourth-and-inches for the 1-yard TD run that tied the sport.
“I knew I had to punch it in (to tie it),” Parent mentioned. “I had to use all the force in my body that my dad gave me, that my mom gave me.”
The offense was resilient to get the job accomplished, however numerous defensive performs all through stored St. Mary’s within the recreation. That included Tyler Guy’s deal with on fourth down on the Spartans’ 1-yard-line to simply barely forestall Winthrop from scoring one other landing earlier than the break.
“The tackle down at the goal line (was clutch),” Driscoll mentioned. “The one-on-one plays, in high school football, it comes down to those one-on-one plays. We were fortunate tonight to be in the game. Once we felt we had some momentum, we kind of took it over in the fourth quarter.”
Source: www.bostonherald.com
