Newport
Consider this: Stevens was penalized 13 times, including some dandies like a late hit, an unsportsmanlike conduct, a personal foul and four false starts.
And then there were three fumbles and two interceptions between the teams.
But when the day was done, Stevens was 4-0 and Newport, recovering nicely from a shellacking at Inter-Lakes last week, is 2-2.
Stevens coach Paul Silva thought the game was physical, and he was bothered by the penalties.
“Not only did we get a lot of penalties, we got some at the wrong time,” he said. “We’ve got to correct that.”
The game was decided by two big offensive plays, both by Stevens on the simple fullback dive. Stevens ran the play just twice, and both times Zach O’Brien went on long runs right up the middle, one of 59 yards and one of 71.
While O’Brien gets most the glory, he had some help: He went through a man-size hole created by junior linemen Aiden Cahill, Brendan Bean and Nick Stone. Each time O’Brien was handed the ball and blasted into the line, nobody was there to hit him. Cahill, Bean and Stone had opened the door and O’Brien burst through. By the time the linebackers and defensive back saw what was happening, it was too late.
Cahill, who afterward was clutching the Chamber Trophy that goes to the winner, realized it was a game his team could have lost. “We picked it up in the second half, and good thing we did,” Cahill said.
Of those two plays that turned the game around, Cahill said there was nothing special: “Just get the man across from you out of the way so Zach can take off.”
Newport led most of the game, as Stevens didn’t tie the game until late in the third quarter and took the lead with 5:32 left in the fourth quarter.
With time running out, the Cards set up to punt from their own 35, but the snap was over the head of punter Derrick Stanhope. He hurried back, retrieved the ball and got off a 22-yard boot on the run.
Instead of pinning the Tigers deep in their own territory, the ball was on the Newport 45 with less than a minute to play. There was a short gain in a pass play and an incompletion before quarterback Dylan McNamara (5-for-13, 105 yards) completed two passes to Cam Ackerman, one of 16 yards and another of seven. But the game ended when McNamara’s pass into the end zone was knocked away by Stevens safety Parker Smith.
While Newport coach Richard Boone was not happy with the loss, he was happy that his team showed improvement from the week before.
“I talked to the offensive line about character, and I think we should some character today,” said the first-year coach, who wished a couple of those near-miss passes were completions. “Dylan (McNamara) dropped a couple of those passes right on the mark, but we couldn’t make the catch.”
When Stevens opened the game with O’Brien’s 59-yard run on the second play from scrimmage, there was some groaning among the Newporters about a repeat from last week.
But those thoughts were short-lived, as Newport also scored on its first possession, a 55-yard drive, aided by a late Stevens hit and a tackle-breaking run by John Hogan after snaring a McNamara pass. John Thibault (13 carries, 49 yards) took the ball in from the 4, and Tyler Sharron’s extra point gave Newport a 7-6 lead.
Newport padded its lead, when Thibault scored his second TD in the second quarter. Prior to the score, Newport got 49-yard run from Ackerman on a reverse that got the Tigers to the 5, from where Thibault took it in. Sharron’s extra point made it 14-6.
The score remained that way until a third-quarter Newport fumble, recovered by Bell, gave Stevens the ball on the Newport 9. Two plays later Stevens quarterback Henri Bourque (11-for-22, 102 yards) hit a wide-open Smith in the end zone with 1:12 left in the period, and the score was tied at 14 after Bell’s 2-point conversion in the third period.
Stevens’ next drive was hurt by a holding penalty that sent the Cardinals back to their own 29. Then for the second time, the fullback dive was called and O’Brien went 71 yards to put the Cardinals on top for good.