Finlay's late TD, 2-point conversion give Nashua North football win over Pinkerton (video)

DERRY - The play call was for a play-action pass, but the way previous 47 minutes of Thursday night's game had gone, Derek Finlay was probably going to end up running.

With the Nashua High School North football team in need of a touchdown, and his first option covered up, Finlay tucked the ball and ran for the end zone, crossing the goal line with just over nine seconds left.

Now down one point against Pinkerton Academy, Finlay took the ball again and pushed his way through contact to get the two-point conversion and give the Titans a 42-41 win over the Astros in a Division I game. It was North's first win against Pinkerton since 2010 and only the third time the Titans have beaten the Astros in program history.

"That was a play-action pass, but they committed to Jordyn (Raisanen-Andino) out there and I just took it up the middle," Finlay said. "I was thinking that the whole time, ever since we lost to (Nashua) South on a two-point conversion, I’ve wanted to do it. Go down the field, drive, and get in on the last play. It felt good because we’ve had a lot of dog fights in the last minutes."

It was the fourth one-point game of the year for North (4-4) and the seventh decided by one score. The 3-yard touchdown run was Finlay's fourth rushing score of the game, as he ran for 158 yards on 21 carries while also completing 14 of 17 passes for 178 yards and an interception.

"There’s a run-option involved," North coach Dante Laurendi said of the game-winning score. "If you’ve got green grass, go, and (Finlay) did. It gives us choices and buys some time. He made the right decision because he saw it rather than running the risk of throwing it. It was great execution on his part."

Raisanen-Andino added 59 yards and two touchdowns on the ground and had two receptions for 46 yards and Nick DiGesse had 10 catches for 97 yards.

Caden Michaud led Pinkerton (6-2) with 137 yards and a touchdown on seven carries while Cole Yennaco had 123 yards and a score on 16 carries. Jack Mackiernan added two touchdowns and 46 yards on six carries, as Pinkerton outgained North 416-415.

The teams were also even in turnovers, with two apiece, with both of the Astros' takeaways coming in the first quarter and setting them up inside the Titans' 15-yard line.

After each team scored on its opening drive, Pinkerton punted the ball to North, giving the Titans a first down on their own 28. But two plays later, John Barry, Jr., lost a fumble that Don Terrio returned to the 1-yard line, and Nathan Campos scored on the next play to give the Astros a 14-7 lead.

North started its next possession a its own 16, and after losing five yards on first down, a pass from Finlay hit off Jack Peters and caromed straight up into the air. Mackiernan came down with the ball, giving Pinkerton a first down at North's 11.

Pinkerton got down to the 3-yard line, but North's defense held, forcing a field goal. A bad snap on the attempt forced holder Russell Patrikas to pick up the ball and his pass to Anthony DeSalvo came up short of the end zone.

"We left a lot of points on the field," Pinkerton coach Brian O'Reilly said. "That was a conversation we had at halftime. That was not well done by us, especially with the turnovers that we got. We missed out on a touchdown, so we decided to go for the field goal, and for the first time this year, we had a high snap, so we don’t get the field goal. Then we miss an extra point. All that stuff comes back to bite you in the end."

The Titans responded with a 12-play, 92-yard drive that included two third-down conversions and a fourth-and-2 conversion that saw Finlay hit Raisanen-Andino for a short gain that the junior took 37 yards to the Astros' 8. Finlay scored two plays later, but the Titans missed the extra point to trail 14-13.

A 3-yard touchdown run by Mackiernan gave Pinkerton a 20-13 lead it took into halftime, but North opened the second half with a nine-play, 75-yard drive and tied the game on a 1-yard run by Raisanen-Andino.

The teams traded touchdowns to make it a 27-27 game, and with 5:09 left in the third, North's Toby Brown, Jr., forced a fumble that Bryson Borromeo recovered to give the Titans a first down at the Astros' 24. On fourth-and-1 at the 15, Finlay scored to give North its first lead, 34-27, with 3:26 left in the third.

Each team punted on its next possession and Pinkerton took over at its own 15 with 11:01 remaining in the game. The Astros went 85 yards in 12 plays, tying the game on a 5-yard run by Yennaco. With 6:25 left, Picasso Bates successfully executed an onside kick, giving Pinkerton possession at North's 49.

"We weren’t stopping them, whether they were deep at the 20 or up at the 50," O'Reilly said. "It really wasn’t that hard a decision. If we didn’t get the ball, how is that going to be any different than what we’ve been showing. When you do onside kicks, you’re always worried about what if they recover, you set them up in great field position. The big question is why didn’t we onside kick every single time."

The Astros needed just five plays to find the end zone, scoring on a 12-yard run by Mackiernan to go up 41-34 with 3:13 remaining. Bates put the kickoff inside North's 10-yard line, but Raisanen-Andino returned it to the Titans' 29.

North picked up a pair of first downs, getting to the Pinkerton 45, but penalties on three straight plays - including two blocking infractions - moved the Titans back to their own 32, setting up first-and-35.

"All those plays, we got good gains, they just got taken back," Finlay said. "We had to do it again, got the 35 (yards) back and got the first down."

Finlay hit DiGesse for a 34-yard gain and then two connected again for another four yards and a first down at Pinkerton's 32.

"We had three timeouts left, so we had time," Laurendi said. "I thought we were moving the ball pretty well. We were taking what they were giving us in the pass game. We got a couple of runs in there before we had all the penalties before we put ourselves in first-and-80, or whatever it was."

Two plays later, Finlay ran for 23 yards to give North a first-and-goal at the Pinkerton 3, but on fourth down, that was still where the Titans had the ball, setting up the quarterback's game-winning run.