Dover shocks, beats up on Bishop Guertin

NASHUA – Steve Cuipa took a quick drop, turned to his right and fired a pass toward the goal line.

Kevin Kiczuk was there to haul it in in the end zone and the Bishop Guertin High School football team and its fans began to celebrate.

The revelry was just a little too soon.

The Cardinals were called for holding on the play, one of 14 penalties whistled against Bishop Guertin, and two incomplete passes later, it turned the ball over on downs. That was the closest the Cardinals would come to getting on the board in a 7-0 loss to Dover in a Division II contest at Stellos Stadium on Saturday.

“I’m disappointed that we didn’t execute the things that we were working on all week,” Bishop Guertin coach Tony Johnson said. “We just had these mental breakdowns in penalties. We couldn’t do anything on the line of scrimmage. We couldn’t run our option. The general point of emphasis was to establish a running game. We couldn’t do it.”

Of the Cardinals’ 14 penalties, half were false starts, including one before the first play on what would be their final drive of the game.

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Bishop Guertin gained just 172 yards, 107 of it on the ground, as Cuipa led the way with 50 yards rushing and 64 yards passing. The Cardinals quarterback might have had better numbers, but he was constantly under pressure whenever he dropped back and was sacked four times.

“Cuipa was running for his life,” Johnson said. “It wasn’t there. We have some good talented receivers who weren’t catching the ball tonight. We just weren’t making the plays.”

But while the Cardinals (3-1 in Division II, 4-2 overall) struggled to move the ball, so did the Green Wave (3-2, 3-3).

Dover had just 122 yards of offense, with its most successful drive coming on its first of the game.

Cuipa was knocked from the game momentarily on Bishop Guertin’s third play from scrimmage, and Bob Fahey came on for the rest of the drive, which ended on an interception by Dover’s Ian Seawards. A good return and a late-hit personal foul on the Cardinals gave Dover a first down at Bishop Guertin’s 31.

The Green Wave ran the ball eight times, capped by a fourth-and-goal run from the 1 by Corey MacKoul.

The Dover defense took over from there, bending at times, but never breaking. The Green Wave forced the Cardinals to punt once, but forced a turn-over-on-downs six times, four of which took place on Dover’s side of the field.

“Our defense rallied every single time and made play after play,” Dover coach Ken Osbon said. “We were fortunate to get some in the first half, but you have to give hats off to our defense.”

The Green Wave defense made its biggest stop early in the fourth quarter.

After Alex Eaton returned a punt to the Dover 23-yard line and, after a holding call on the Cardinals on the drive’s first play, Bishop Guertin moved the ball down to the 15, where it faced fourth-and-2.

Brian Bottari busted up the middle on fourth down and had enough for the first down, but appeared to lose the football. Dover celebrated, but the officials ruled Bottari down, giving Bishop Guertin a first down at the 10.

Eaton ran on back-to-back plays to get the ball to the five and Cuipa followed with what for a moment was the tying touchdown pass to Kiczuk. But another hold on the Cardinals moved the ball back to the 19, and two incomplete passes later, Dover’s defense had held.

After having a 20-game win streak snapped last week, the Cardinals lost two in a row for the first time since 2008. As for the last time Bishop Guertin was shut out, Johnson didn’t know.

“Give Dover credit,” Johnson said. “They came in spirited and they won the game. They beat us up in the trenches. No matter how you look at it, we got beat up in the trenches. We’ve got to go back to ground zero.”