Ipswich Leftovers

by Tom Condardo

As the Pioneers wrap up their pregame warmups, they go through a familiar ritual. They alternate two defensive teams and rotate through a quick last minute drill. As soon as one finishes, it sprints off to one side to huddle around assistant coach Jeff Gannon. The other team then hustles on to the field, goes through the drill and dashes off to the other side to a huddle around assistant coach Pat Lamusta. They go through some primal screaming to get pumped for the game and each one finishes the same way. The coaches lead the huddle break by yelling one-two-three DOMINATE and the players follow suit.

It's a good way for the team to get ready for the game, but the Pioneers really took the call to heart Friday night since there was no better word to describe what they did to the Ipswich Tigers than domination. The offense was efficient, scoring on four of their first five possessions to leave no doubt in this one early. But the defense was even more dominant - scary dominant.

The Pioneer defense blew up the Tiger triple option at every turn, not allowing any breathing room. Ipswich ran 16 first half plays broken down as follows. Four for losses, one for no gain, three for a one yard gain, two incomplete passes, two interceptions, and four for positive yardage. The net first half yardage for the Tigers? Three yards. As in one-two-three.

The third quarter was even stronger for the Pioneers. Thanks to a pair of long drives, Ipswich ran only three plays in the quarter: a gain of three, loss of three, and a incomplete pass for net zero yards. At the end of three quarters, the Pioneers owned a 408-3 edge in yardage without allowing a first down. The Tigers punted five times, more than the total net yards (3) and first downs (0) combined.

If that's not dominating, I'm not sure what is.

"I hope it's starting to come together," head coach Neal Weidman on his squad's performance through the first four games. "We really do have a lot of things to work on including getting back to basics. It all starts with great kids. If you have a group of great kids that want to work and improve and on top of that have some guys that can play, that gives you a really good combination."

Red Flags?
If you really want to reach for something to worry about, you can look at the number of penalties the Pioneers have been hit with. They were flagged six times for 60 yards Friday night with two of them nullifying touchdowns. On the year, the Pioneers have been assessed 21 penalties for 200 yards. That's almost equal to half the total yardage the Lynnfield defense has allowed in the four games (516).

But Weidman felt the situation was a bit different Friday night when it came to penalties.

"The penalties (Friday night) were better because the kids were playing hard and aggressive blocking downfield," he told me. "One was a cut block coming back which was probably a good block but he knows he can't do that. The hold on this side I happened to be watching the kid and he was going full speed and was trying to be aggressive and the third one was just playing hard and getting upfield on the play. He held him but it was from getting after it. It was not good that we got the penalty but when it's from playing hard and hustling you can roll with it more."

The Real Thing
It was unfortunate the first persistent rain arrived on the night the Pioneers were playing their only game on real grass in their first seven games. Luckily the field at Jack Welch Stadium was in great shape and there were very few incidents of slipping and sliding.

Streaking
The win was the ninth straight for the Pioneers over the Tigers, tying their longest winning streak against any opponent. Lynnfield won nine in a row over Masco from 1983-1991.

Jumbo Package
Without a true bulldozing running back like Kyle McGah or Jake Rourke, Weidman has added a wrinkle to the offense by putting tight end captain Drew Balestrieri in the backfield with Alex Soden as the up man in short yardage situations. They unveiled it last week against Amesbury and Balestrieri scored his first TD. The Pioneers trotted it out again against Ipswich on first and goal from the four and the senior blasted in again for the Pioneers' third TD of the game.

There was a pretty big hole and an Ipswich linebacker tried an arm tackle at the two yard line but the 6'0" 210 lb. Balestrieri barely broke stride as he barreled into the endzone.

"He's a big, strong kid," Weidman said of Balestrieri. "It's a package we've started using in short yardage situations."

Double Trouble
Speaking of Balestrieri, we spoke earlier in the year about the challenge opponents face when the Pioneers line up in double tight end formation with Balestrieri and fellow captain CJ Finn. Almost every opposing coach mentions the difficulty that poses since the Pioneers can launch a strong rushing attack from that formation but can also go with an effective passing game since both can catch and run. Finn has five catches for 59 yards and a TD on the year and Balestrieri has five catches for 50 yards.

"They're both big and physical, strong and smart and they understand football," Weidman said of the pair. "When we can stretch the line out a little bit with them it's helpful.

Dynamic Duo
And while we're on the topic of twosomes, it's time to talk about the stellar play of quarterback Jake McHugh and his favorite target Louis Ellis.

McHugh has been outstanding in his first four games, completing 39 of 60 (65%) for 603 yards, seven touchdowns, and no interceptions. His NFL quarterback passing rating is 137.0. For reference, Danny Sullivan, one of the best QB's to play for the Pioneers, finished his career with a 122.7 rating. The top score in the scale is 158.3.

"He's played well," Weidman said. "He asks the right questions and he's working at it."

Ellis, a junior seeing his first extended action at receiver, has been superb as well. He has 12 catches for 233 yards and four touchdowns, scoring in every game so far this season.

"As a sophomore (Jake) was switching between receiver and quarterback and last year he and Louis were going back and forth," Weidman said. "A quarter of the way through last season I said that's it - Louis is a receiver and Jake is the quarterback. I was going back and forth and they weren't necessarily getting better at either one because they were splitting so much time. We just went with it and Louis is a pretty good receiver and Jake's been playing well too, so it's worked out."

Kiddie Corps
And finally, for our last daily double, we have to mention the play of sophomores Nick Kinnon and Andrew DePalma. Kinnon is the backup quarterback but Weidman has been working to get the ball in his hands more. DePalma saw extended action last week in the blowout over Amesbury and got another opportunity against Ipswich with captain Drew McCarthy out with an ankle injury.

Kinnon led the Pioneers in rushing Friday night with 104 yards on six carries including a scintillating 63 yard TD run. He is the team's second leading rushier with 197 yards on 13 carries, a sparkling 15.2 yard per carry average.

DePalma is fourth on the team in rushing with 115 yards on 16 carries, an impressive 7.2 yards per carry average.

"They both run hard," Weidman said of his two sophomores. "Kinnon is fast and we're trying to find ways to get him touches but it's tough when you play quarterback. You can't have him rep at everything."

That's it for now. Check back Tuesday night when I'll take a look around the Baker and at the Division Four North playoff race.