Around the CAL/NEC 4: Week One

It was all non league action for the opening week of the season and there are some interesting results to discuss. But first, let's take a look at the standings.



We'll start with the league favorites and in that discussion, the defending champs rise to the top of the list. Despite losing 13 seniors including seven All-Leaguers, Hamilton-Wenham picked up where they left off last year, winning their 16th straight regular season game.

The hosted a young Triton team and after a slow start, came roaring back for an impressive 35-15 win.

Pat Sheehan's Vikings actually scored first on a 70 yard quarterback draw by Bradley Whitman, younger brother of two year starter Blaise Whitman who has graduated. The Generals answered back with two touchdowns in the second quarter, the first a 10 yard pass from last year's Player of the Year Trevor Lyons and the second when Lyons ran one in from ten yards out.

H-W put it away in the third, unveiling their newest weapon, freshman running back Cam Macry, who scored to make it 21-8. Lyons, who ran for 175 yards on the day, scooted in from the 20 to make it 28-8 and the rout was on. After Whitman tossed a 50 yard TD pass, the Generals' Steve Turpin added a three yard TD run in the fourth to account for the final score.

The question going into the game centered on the Generals offensive line which lost everyone but Matt Vogus. They looked fine in the opener as H-W ran for nearly 300 yards.

"They are still good," Sheehan told me. "They just wore us down. We were able to move the ball against them, but we couldn't get our defense off the field."

Sheehan pointed out that if teams decide to "load the box" to stop Lyons, Macry and Turpin, then the Generals will go to a pair of tall receivers who can catch. One of them, sophomore Jim Campbell, hauled in a 10 yard touchdown pass from Lyons.

The Generals head to West Newbury for another non league tilt against Pentucket this week.

Meanwhile, down Route 1 in Saugus, North Reading was serving notice that the preseason prognosticators who picked them as a favorite to take the title, were on to something.

The Hornets, with a full season of the single wing under their belts, came out strong, plowing through the  Sachems in a 27-10 victory. To no one's surprise, Carl Lipani, the number two scorer in Division 3A last year with 151 points, led the way. The elusive back rushed for 208 yards and three TD's. Quarterback Jackson Kellogg had the Hornets'sother tally.

"Saugus has improved since last year," Ed Melanson, the Hornets' offensive coordinator told me. "They have some very good size and 25 seniors and gave us a tough time for a while. Penalties really hurt us on a couple of nice drives early on and then we had two turnovers. Like a lot of teams we will need to play cleaner in the following weeks."

Melanson said the Hornet defense was outstanding with Saugus' only touchdown coming on defense when they recovered a Lipani fumble and ran it in for the score.

"Not very Lipani-like," the coach noted.

"All in all we are happy with the performance, but there is still a ton of room for improvement," Melanson summed up. "And we better clean it up fast because next week is Newburyport and we know how good they are and we will have to play one heck of a game to stay with them."

While scouting the Clippers, Melanson had the chance to see the Pioneers as well and came away impressed with their performance in Friday night's loss."

"Lynnfield looks big and as always well coached," he said. "Should be a fun season."

The Hornets will host the Clippers on Friday night so we should get a good comparison to the Pioneers from that contest.

Another team with a big win over the weekend was the young Georgetown team which routed Division 5 West Bridgewater 41-14. The Royals snapped a nine game losing streak which stretches back to when the beat W. B last year in the opener.

The big guns for Georgetown were receiver Colby Ingraham who had three receptions for over 100 yards and running back Tim Dillon who ran for 110 yards and a score. Matt Prescott scored on a 36 yard run and Zach Curtain ran one in from the nine. Niko Edwards threw a touchdown pass to Thomas Zargaj and ran for a 25 yard score. Jackson Fritz also threw a TD pass.

The Royals were up 14-0 at halftime then blew it open with 27 second half points.

Georgetown will get a much sterner test this Friday night when they travel to Revere jumping up to Division 1A to take on the Patriots.

Over in Ipswich, the Tigers struggled against a strong Pinegree team in a 34-7 loss. Ipswich played the Highlanders tough for a half, trailing only 14-7 at the break having rushed for 108 yards. But Pinegree ramped it up with two touchdowns in the third quarter and one in the fourth to seal the win.

Kyle Barber scored the Tigers' only TD on a 10 yard run.

Ipswich travels to Whittier on Saturday morning in a battle of the Tigers.

Finally, in a game that just might say more about Amesbury than it does about Manchester Essex, the Indians handled the Hornets fairly easily in a 28-7 win at Landry Stadium. M-E returns a huge line, a good starting quarterback in Cory Burnham, a solid running back in Jake Fitzgerald and a nice receiver in Joe Beardsley.

None of that apparently had any affect as the Indian defense shut down the Hornet attack until the final quarter when they scored late on a Burnham eight yard run. That tells me that the Amesbury defense is a load and that the Pioneers could be in for another defensive battle when they travel to Landry this Friday night.

Manchester-Essex hosts Saugus this Friday which will give us a comp on North Reading who handled the Sachems last week.

That's it for now. Check back on Wednesday for my next post on the 1973 Pioneer team and on Thursday for my full preview of the Amesbury game.