Bishop Guertin football stymies Salem to pick up win (video)

NASHUA - John Trisciani knew that if the Bishop Guertin High School football team had any chance of upsetting Salem, the Cardinals were going to have to do it with their defense.

Sure enough, it was a defensive play that got Bishop Guertin going.

Jakob Baker brought down Aidan McDonald in the end zone midway through the third quarter for the first points of the game, and Bishop Guertin followed that up with a pair of touchdown drives. The Cardinals then held on for a 17-14 win as the Blue Devils' furious comeback came up short at Stellos Stadium.

Matt Santosuosso and Charlie Bellavance each had rushing touchdowns for Bishop Guertin (2-0), but it was the safety that came with 7:43 left in the third and made it 2-0 that got things going for the Cardinals.

It came after Bishop Guertin recovered an onside kickoff to open the second half and drove inside the Salem 30-yard line. On fourth-and-4, Santosuosso was intercepted at the 2-yard line, and on the next play, Baker put his team on the board.

"It’s a momentum thing," Trisciani said. "Usually, you don’t see a lot of safeties. It’s situational football. It’s fourth-and-4, they intercept it, and it acts like a punt. It’s a teaching moment for their kids and our kids. If you knock that down, it’s a completely different scenario.

"It was clearly a game plan to fly around and be as physical as possible on defense. We talked and thought we probably had to score at least 24 to have a shot. You don’t know. They scored 62 points last week, so we knew we had to slow it down."

After rushing for over five hundred yards and scoring 62 points in a win over Nashua South last week, the Blue Devils (1-1) moved the ball, outgaining Bishop Guertin 362-264. But Salem lost two fumbles inside the Cardinals' 25-yard line, were stopped at the 2-yard line on another drive, and were unable to get the big plays it had against the Panthers.

"Give BG all the credit in the world," Salem coach Steve Abraham said. "They had a great game plan, they did exactly what we said they were going to do. They were going to milk the clock. Everything that we thought. We played great defense, we miscommunicated a couple of times, and offensively, we moved the ball up and down the field, but we turned the ball over three times."

Santosuosso led Bishop Guertin with 134 yards and a touchdown on 26 carries and was 3 of 7 passing for 64 yards and the pick. Bellavance added 66 yards on the ground with a score and also had a 31-yard reception on a screen play that helped set up what proved to be the game-winning touchdown.

On the play, the Cardinals faced a third-and-15 from Salem's 44, and the junior running back rumbled down to the 13. Three plays later, on another third down, he scored from 10 yards out, and after a miscue on the conversion, Bellavance caught the two-pointer to make it 17-0 with 5:18 left.

"We saw they weren’t really looking for the pass, just the run," Santosuosso said of the screen pass. "When we rolled out the pass, we knew they wouldn’t be able to get to the left side, so Charlie made a good play on that."

Bishop Guertin had chances to take a lead in the first half, as it drove down the field on its first two possessions, but stalled at Salem's 10-yard line and turned it over on downs each time.

"We did enough on offense to hold on to the ball and drive," Trisciani said. "The two red zone trips early on and not scoring is a problem. It was all defense. How many of those missed opportunities are going to come back and get you? The kids are tough. There’s 50 something of them. We have not depth and they just fight."

Salem got right back in the game after Bellavance's touchdown, as Noah Mustapha hit McDonald for a 71-yard touchdown reception. After getting the ball back, the Blue Devils went on an 11-play, 74-yard drive, make it a three-point game on an 11-yard run by McDonald.

But the Cardinals recovered the onside kick with 1:21 remaining and were able to run out the clock.

McDonald finished with138 yard rushing on 20 carries, while Thomas Ahlers had 73 yards on seven carries and Mustapha was 6 of 9 passing for 123 yards.

"This is what’s good, a little adversity hit," Abraham said. "This is when you want to get it out. It’ll be a good game Friday night. We’re going to try against Pinkerton and we’ll bring our best."