When Nick Cappuccio forced a St. Mary’s fumble and Philip Boncore pounced on the football late in the third quarter and received a triumphant reception from his teammates upon his return to the sidelines, all the momentum pointed to Winthrop protecting its 14-point lead and ending the Spartans’ winning streak.
But some costly miscues hurt the Vikings over the final 13 minutes and instead of leaving Manning Field last Friday night with a signature victory in the Coach Jon Cadigan Era, it was St. Mary’s and head coach Sean Driscoll who had the memorable ‘W’, defeating the Vikings, 15-14, in a showdown of two of the top teams in the division. Driscoll recorded the 100th victory of his stellar coaching career (see story on Page 1).
Winthrop was clearly in command for most of the first three quarters of football. The rushing attack, led by the Big Four of Nick Cappuccio, Robert Rich, George Galuris, and Demetri Koutsouflakis, gave Winthrop the upper hand over the St. Mary’s defense in the first half. Cappuccio’s 25-yard TD run opened the scoring before Galuris booted the first of his two PATs.
Winthrop threatened deep in St. Mary’s territory in the second quarter, but Tyler Guy made a great 1-on-1 tackle on Cappuccio (receiving a pass from quarterback Matt Noonan) at the 1-yard line to deny the touchdown.
A 2-yard touchdown run by Koutsouflakis helped make it 14-0 with 7:02 left in the third quarter.
But following the Cappuccio-Boncore big defensive play at the Winthrop 9-yard line, as Coach Jon Cadigan said afterwards, “then the wheels came off.”
A Winthrop fumble and high snap on a Winthrop punt (resulting in a St. Mary’s safety for two points) opened the door to the Spartans’ comeback. St. Mary’s freshman Maxwell Parent would score his second of two touchdowns with 2:21 left in the game to knot it at 14-14. Driscoll opted for the PAT attempt, and Parent booted the go-ahead point, despite Boncore getting a piece of the football which just made it way over the crossbar (the horizontal bar between the two uprights on the goalpost).
The Vikings were stopped on their final possession of the game on four downs.
It was a tough defeat for the Vikings, who were looking to establish themselves as the divisional frontrunner with a sweep of last year’s Super Bowl champion (St. Mary’s) and finalist (Stoneham).
“We had a lot of self-inflicted things happen, and I’m not trying to take anything from St. Mary’s, but there were a lot of things that we didn’t do in the game,” said Cadigan. “We felt really good going into the game that we could be the better team, but I think there’s always something to be said about a team that’s coming off a championship in a sense they (St. Mary’s) have a championship mettle and they’re not fazed by certain situations. In order for us to get there, we have to overcome those scenarios that we had in this game.”
Near Misses in the Red Zone
Winthrop Quarterback Matt Noonan fired the ball right into Nick Cappuccio’s hands at the 1-yard line, but Tyler Guy met Cappuccio immediately to make the tackle and save a touchdown.
Winthrop’s tall and talented tight end Daniel Thomai ran an excellent route over the middle on a terrific, fourth-down play call, but the pass just missed connecting on the Vikings’ first possession of the game.
“I liked the call by Coach [Mark] D’Ambrosio. We just have to execute it better,” said Cadigan.
George Galurus Named Defensive Player of the Game
George Galuris received the Vikings’ Black
Shirt Defensive Player of the Game Award. It was Galuris’ second consecutive game as the recipient. Galuris had 10 tackles and three assists on tackles.
“George has probably been our best defensive player throughout the preseason and now in the regular season,” said Cadigan. “He put in a lot of work in the offseason in the weight room and it’s starting to show up.”
The Boncore Block on PAT
Coach Cadigan confirmed through a videotape of the game that Philip Boncore did, in fact, get a hand on the game-winning PAT by St. Mary’s Maxwell Parent.
“Philip gets a hand on the ball, blocks the kick, and the ball still goes through,” said Cadigan. “I don’t know how many times that happens in football, but it happened to us.”
A Road Game with the Big Blue
Winthrop will head to Blocksidge Field in Swampscott Friday (7 p.m.) for a game with the Big Blue.
Swampscott (1-0-1) battled Auburn to a 15-15 tie in its opener before defeating Lynn English, 27-12 in week 2.