Staples James Fruscaiante leaps up to catch a ball for a touchdown in Saturday's 24-21 victory over McMahon. Photo: Christian Abraham / Connecticut Post
They almost pulled it off.
New Canaan's Louis Hagopian muscles through the defense with help from Nick Pelli as New Canaan defeated Fairfield Warde 28-14 Friday night. Photo: Shelley Cryan
Fairfield Warde on Friday night, then McMahon and Hamden on Saturday night almost gave us the shakeup we were looking for.
But their established opponents, New Canaan, Staples and West Haven, respectively, pulled off wild, come-from-behind victories to keep the status quo in the region. New Canaan beat Warde 28-14 in a Friday thriller. Staples topped McMahon 24-21 on a last-second field goal.
While chaos rained [sic] upon the region Friday night, everything seemed to tidy up nicely, if not bizarrely, on Saturday.
Watching Derby and Ansonia play their second half at Shelton’s Finn Stadium riled up a few old-timers, I’m sure, but it did nothing to stop Ansonia from burying Derby 55-19. …Fairfield Prep kept its foot on the gas and defeated Wilbur Cross 35-18. …Hillhouse pulled away from Foran 50-26 [this and more from the Saturday Roundup].
Of all the teams forced to suspend play and return to the field Saturday, Hamden was the only one that looked rejuvenated by the day off. Down 24-14, the Dragons rallied to take a 31-24 lead behind quarterback Tim Dube, only to see if disappear quickly thanks to a 66-yard TD pass from Nick Nieves to Tahir Manning with just seconds remaining. Almost, Hamden. Almost.
In the SWC, it was a pretty tame week. We saw Newtown and Pomperaug both won handily and moved to 3-0 heading into Thursday’s mega SWC matchup. Bunnell is 3-0 after rolling Oxford, 55-20, behind a huge day from David Camille.
Casey Cochran broke the state record for touchdowns and Masuk broke score management against Stratford, 56-0. If the information we have is correct, coach John Murphy will not be suspended. Brandon Schmidt helped Bethel win a shootout vs. New Fairfield. The Wildcats are 2-1 along with Weston in the SWC. Brookfield (over Notre Dame-Fairfield), New Milford (over Barlow) also got their first wins of the season.
Darien's Peter Gesualdi sails over St. Joseph's Jon Prutting to score a touchdown during Saturday's game at Dalling Field. Photo: Autumn Driscoll
In the FCIAC on Saturday, Norwalk (yes, Norwalk), Wilton (yes, Wilton) and Darien joined New Canaan and Staples as the league’s remaining 3-0 teams. Ridgefield dumped Stamford, Danbury crushed Central, and Trinity Catholic took care of Harding to reach get to 2-1. Trumbull, meanwhile, is 2-0 heading into a big game at home vs. 2-1 Greenwich.
The Cardinals played, perhaps, the craziest game of Week 3, falling to New London 51-33. Kyle McKinnon torched Greenwich for 236 yards and three touchdowns. New quarterback Rob Key threw for 302 yards three touchdowns. The game also featured three interception return TDs, including (officially) a 99-yarder Greenwich’s Ryan Kelly scored from five yards deep in the opposing end zone.
[You can see highlights from that game here: second half | first half. We'll have a full version later.]
What does it say about New London? What does it say about Greenwich? (over 500 yards of total offense? Bananas.)
Quick notes, provided by Dave Ruden of The Advocate: Trinity RB/DB Shaquan Howsie is done for the year, as is Fairfield Warde WR Kevin Krug. Both suffered knee injuries in week two.
All and all, some interesting results, if not completely shocking. Are there some pretenders among the 3-0 teams. We’ll try to break it down in the coming days.
TOP PERFORMERS
- Arkeel Newsome, Ansonia — 401 yards, 4 TD rushing, 1 TD receiving vs. Derby
- James Harrington, Danbury — 225 yards, 4 TD rushing vs. Central
- David Camille, Bunnell — 201 yards, 5 TD vs. Oxford
- Connor Shanahan, New Milford — 263 yards, 3 TD passing
- John Shannon, Bullard-Havens — 230 yards, 4 TD rushing vs. Wolcott Tech
- Matt Aspinwall, Foran — 23-41, 315 yards, 2 TD passing vs. Hillhouse.
- Lou Fenaroli, Newtown — 189 yards, 4 TDs rushing vs. Weston
- Peter Gesualdi, Darien — 2 TDs, 2 INT vs St. Joseph
- Delshawn Wilson, Norwalk — 14 of 16, 191 yards, 3 TDs passing vs. Westhill
- Dan Hebert, Newtown — 85-yard punt return TD, 2 INT vs. Weston
- Casey Cochran, Masuk — 185 yards, 2 TDs, became state’s all-time leader in career passing touchdowns (86) vs. Stratford
QUOTES OF THE WEEK
“I’ve been a head coach a long time and I’ve never seen a play just not count.” –Barlow coach Rob Tynan, believing officials during a 28-9 loss to New Milford incorrectly moved chains during a play. The ensuing argument lasted approximately 10 minutes.
“You can’t take us lightly anymore.” – Norwalk quarterback Delshawn Wilson.
“The kids were fired up to be home. I saw passion that we didn’t see before.” – Fairfield Prep coach Tom Shea
“It was Ansonia football weather. We wanted to get down and pound the ball. We wanted to get muddy. It was awesome.” – Dylan Vano, Ansonia lineman
“Even when we’re not blocking people, he runs them over. It’s a real nice thunder-and-lightning combination we have with (Fenaroli) and (Dan) Hebert.” – Newtown coach Steve George
“We just wanted it a lot. No one wanted to go home with a loss. It just wasn’t going to happen.” – Jack Massie, Staples QB
“We’ve got to walk out of here with our head held high and realize that we can play with a team like this. I knew we could. The kids knew we could. It hurts.” – A.J. Albano, McMahon coach
TWEET OF THE WEEK
This from @CTFootballLive, otherwise known as Bay on this space, responding to an update from @CurrenSCC at the Xavier-Cheshire game. Cheshire was down 14-0 at the time this came over:
GAMES TO WATCH WEEK 4
Remember, short week for most teams. A good portion of the schedule will be played Thursday night.
- Bunnell at Weston, Thursday, 3:45 p.m. – The honeymoon’s over for Weston as Air Castelot comes to town.
- Ridgefield at Wilton, Thursday, 6 — OK, now we get to see what Wilton’s really all about.
- Greenwich at Trumbull, Thursday, 6 — The jury remains out on both of these FCIAC contenders. Don’t look now, but this might be Greenwich’s highest hurdle until the FCIAC title game.
- Newtown at Pomperaug, Thursday, 7 – Huge matchup in the SWC title race. Lou Fenaroli and the Hawks take on Eric Beatty and the Panthers in a clash of 3-0 teams.
- Hand at Cheshire, Thursday, 7 — Hand finally gets to play an opponent of its caliber. Cheshire still licking its wounds from last week’s 42-20 loss to Xavier.
- West Haven at Notre Dame-WH, Friday, 7 – Notre Dame’s rounding back into form after its 28-0 victory over Shelton. The Westies were just lucky to survive Hamden.
- Holy Cross at Ansonia, Friday, 7 — Possible preview of the NVL title game?
- Norwalk at Trinity Catholic, Friday, 7 – The big game before the big game. Can the Bears actually get to 4-0 heading into Week 5′s game vs. New Canaan?
ANSONIA AT DERBY … THE MOVIE!
We’ll leave you with the first-half carnage from Derby’s DeFilippo Field from Friday night. I’ve gotta say the last momest of the first half looked like the opening scene of ‘The Last Boy Scout.’ We didn’t shoot the second half at Shelton (camera troubles… I wonder why), but we got post-game interviews. Enjoy.
