So this year the Pioneers have played a quarterback as dangerous as Bishop Feehan's Nick Romero (HW's Trevor Lyons). They have contained a running back nearly as good as Matt Allen (NR's Carl Lipani). They've handled a running back almost as quick as Isaiah Douglas (Pentucket's Cody Rothwell). They stopped a fullback as bruising as Matt Glebus (Amesbury's Perry Mroz). They played toe to toe against a fast aggressive defense nearly as good as Feehan's (Newburyport). They beat back a tough offensive line a cut below the Shamrocks (North Reading.)
But they never had to take them all on in one game.
And to cap it off by paraphrasing a certain head coach who plays his home games at Gillette, the Shamrocks just made more plays than the Pioneers.
Despite all that, and in spite of a quick Feehan start, the Pioneers clawed their way back into the game. They nearly tied it on the first play of the second half with the halfback option pass that missed and twice in the fourth quarter they were close to making it a one score game. They just couldn't punch it in from the 11or the two against an outstanding Shamrock defense.
That tough defense was no surprise to Pioneer head coach Neal Weidman.
"All you had to do was watch one film and you could tell their team speed was fantastic," the coach said. "That defensively was their m.o. all year. Yards were hard to come by. They were all over the place defensively."
To that point, seven of quarterback captain Mike Karavetsos' 19 pass attempts were tipped by Shamrock defenders. Six were incomplete and one captain Alex Pascucci was able to juggle into a reception. Pascucci had a fantastic game with four catches for 73 yards, an interception that prevented a sure touchdown at the end of the first half and running down Matt Allen to prevent a touchdown on the 47 yard screen pass on the third play of the game.
The first oh-oh of the game came on that screen pass. The Pioneer defense stuffed the Shamrocks on their first two plays forcing a 3rd and seven, but the screen pass, the only pass Romero completed in the game, was the perfect call and vividly showed the speed the Shamrocks would be utilizing in the game. Douglas reinforced it on the next play when he zoomed in for the score.Leading up to the game, Feehan's coaches and offensive linemen were pretty confident about their ability to play man on man, be "tougher" and just beat their opponents to the punch. I didn't think a team could do that to the Pioneers, but on the blood-draining, 80 yard, 19 play, 9:49 minute second TD march, they did exactly that. Not that they were ever able to break one, but they continued to win the tough battle in the trenches.
"You never want to have those types of drives when you're on defense," Weidman said. "Obviously it shortens the game and chewed up a lot of time."
The Pioneers thus found themselves down 14-0 to a team that gave up only an average of 6.5 points per game. But Weidman didn't feel the slow start was caused by Pioneer nerves on being on the big stage.
"I think it was a case of playing against a good team," the coach replied.
Give the Pioneers credit though. They didn't get this far by packing it in, and they didn't Saturday night. They put together some plays and drove 72 yards in 14 plays, cutting the lead to 14-7 late in the half.
"We ran the ball fairly well on that drive," Weidman said. "Their team speed is fantastic so it was tough to pick up big chunks of yards but we were able to pick up first downs. And we did what we wanted to do which was to mix in passes with runs. We didn't want to get caught up in running on first and second down and then having to throw on third. Their defensive backs are way too fast. You have to keep them off balance. We tried to mix it up a little bit."
Coming out for the second half, the Pioneers nearly tied it up with the option pass but Kyle McGah's throw was out of the reach of a wide open A. J. Gallo.
"The first play to open the second half would have turned the thing around," Weidman said.
"He ran the ball during the season too," Weidman said of Romero who scored two of the Shamrocks' three TD's. "But they have a ton of speed overall. (Allen), (Douglas) and then they go to the full house backfield and put in their power backs. It's one of those things where when you spread the ball around that much and they have that many good players, you can't focus on one guy."
Again the Pioneers kept plugging away and nearly cut it to a one score game.
"We had a chance to get it back to a one score game," Weidman said. "But we were running out of time there late with a chance to punch one in. We had our chances toward the end a little bit. The kids gave themselves a chance."
Despite the loss, the coach recognized that the 2012 season was special.
"In order to get to this point you have to have communication and chemistry," he said. "The kids have to have some sort of camaraderie and have to want to play for each other.
"I hope next year we have a crew like we had this year," the coach summed up. "Not just the seniors but nine through 12, they were a really good, nice group of kids that were great to be around."
Record Breaker
With his two yard TD blast against Feehan, junior Kyle McGah set a new single season rushing TD record with 18. That tops Eric Hansen who ran for 17 TD's in 1978. McGah now has 24 rushing TD's for his career, placing him fourth all time behind Frank Berardino's 31 rushing TD's from 1958-61.
That final TD gave McGah 108 points for the season thus becoming only the third Pioneer in history to crack the 100 point mark in one season. The others were Hansen (128 in 1978) and Berardino (120 in 1960). For his career, McGah has 144 career points, placing him in eighth place behind Berardino who heads the list with 262.
McGah, who was named TV38's player of the game for Lynnfield, finished the season with 1,197 yards rushing and a 6.7 yard per carry average. He is only the second Pioneer to run for more than a 1000 yards since 1989. Dan Veinot had 1,363 in 2000. McGah now has 1,594 career yards.
Happy Returns
Junior Matt Kramich had a couple of catches in the game but was also strong on kickoff returns. He took back three for a total of 78 yards or a 26 yard average. On a couple he was close to breaking it all the way.
Final Touches
Karavetsos finished an outstanding career Saturday night. He ended the season with 963 rushing yards, third best for a single season since 1989. He finished his career with a total of 1,766 yards rushing and 16 touchdowns and an even 100 points, placing him 15th all time.
He also ended up 148/307 for 2,198 yards passing. His 19 career TD passes ties him with Chris Grassi (2006-09) for fourth place all time.
Holy Moly
With the loss to Bishop Feehan, the Pioneers have now lost three games in a row to Catholic schools. Earlier this year they fell to Bishop Fenwick 14-7 and last year they lost to St. Mary's 40-16 a week after beating Fenwick.
All time, Lynnfield has a 9-6 record against Catholic schools. The breakdown is Matignon 3-1, Fenwick 2-1, Cathedral 2-0, St. Mary's/Brookline 1-0, St. Mary's/Lynn 1-1, Bishop Feehan 0-1 and Austin Prep 0-2.
Quick Picks
With Pascucci's interception in the Super Bowl, the 2012 Pioneers finished with 20 picks, the most in a season since I've been keeping stats (since 1989). Nine players had at least one interception with captain Tyler Palumbo, sophomore Cam Rondeau and Pascucci tying for the team lead with four each. Kramich had three while McGah, Anthony Costa, Guilio Pellegrini, Gallo and Connor Lordan each had one.
The previous high in the last 24 seasons was the 1996 team which had 17 led by Tony Reed's six. The 2010 team had 14 led by Rick Berardino's five. The 2003 team had 11 led by Andy Poor and Rick Parziale who each had three.
UniWatch
For the fashion conscious, you may have noticed that the Pioneers sported a different uniform look in the Super Bowl. For the first time all year, Lynnfield wore white jerseys and blue pants. For the rest of the season they wore all blue at home and also as the home team in the playoff against Amesbury. They were 5-0 in those games. On the road they wore all white and were 4-2.
Even Dozen
With the two game trip to the post season, the Pioneers played 12 games for only the second time in their history. The first was in 2009 when they played 11 regular season games and then the playoff game with Austin Prep.
In the 55 years of the program, Lynnfield has played 12 - 11 game seasons, 25 - 10 games seasons, 14 - 9 game seasons and 2 - 8 game seasons.
Overall, the Pioneers are 275-262-11. The 13 games over .500 is the most since 2005. They dipped to eight games under .500 in 2008 , the lowest point in the history of the program. Since then under Weidman, the Pioneers have gone 34-13. At their peak, the Pioneers were 88 games over .500 in 1987 when they sported a 180-92-10 mark.
Of the 55 seasons, the Pioneers have been above .500 27 years, below .500 23 years and right at .500 three years.
Kickin' In
With his PAT Saturday night, seniorAlex Roper ended the season on a high note, successfully making his final eight tries in the three most crucial games of the season. He was 2 for 2 against North Reading, 5 for 5 in the playoff game against Amesbury and 1 for 1 against Feehan. For the season, he made 30 of 38 and for his two year career he hit on 51 of 63 attempts.
His 30 PAT's this season ties him for second place for a single season with Steve Ullian's 2009 season. Ullian holds the single season record with 34 PAT's in 2010.
Roper's 51 career extra points places him second all time behind Ullian's 75 PAT's from 2008-10.
Roper also holds the distinction of being the only Pioneer to hit 5 or more PAT's in a game four times. He was 5 for 5 twice last season and twice this year. Ullian hit 5 twice and 6 once. No other Lynnfield kicker has done it more than once.
Wrapping up 2012
The 2012 Pioneers ended the season with 276 points, fourth best all time behind only 1960 (410), 2010 (336) and 2009 (279). Weidman-coached teams hold three of the top four spots in all time single season scoring.
The 33 rushing TD's this year's team scored is second best all time only to the 1960 juggernaut which tallied 42 touchdowns on the ground. The six passing TD's are the fewest in the Weidman era and the lowest total since 2005.
The 129 points allowed by this year's Pioneers was a 10.8 ppg average, which places them tied for 18th place all time.
The 9-3 record and winning percentage of .750 was 14th best all time.
After this year, Weidman now has a 36-21 record as head coach. His winning percentage of .632 lifts him past Steve Sobieck (49-23, .620) into second place for all time winning percentage. Bill Rodan heads the list at 101-52-2, .652.
The 2010's continue as the winningest decade percentage-wise with a 23-11, .676 mark. The 1970's at 62-33, .646 is in second.
That's it for now. I will resume the final few posts for the Wayback Wednesday feature on the 1973 champion Pioneers later in the week. I apologize for the delay, but the current Pioneers have kept me kinda busy.
Next up will be a post on the banquet with a full report on all the awards and festivities.
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