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# Londonderry football's defense stepped up when needed in win over Bishop Guertin
- URL: https://www.nh-highschoolsports.com/londonderry-footballs-defense-stepped-up-when-needed-in-win-over-bishop-guertin/
- Published: 2022-10-11T20:00:31.000Z
- Updated: 2022-10-11T20:00:31.000Z
- Description: For one series Friday night, Jimmy Lauzon had a flashback to last year's Division I football championship game. The Londonderry High School football team drove deep into Bishop Guertin territory on each of its first two drives, but had nothing on the scoreboard to show for it. An interception in th
- Author: Joe Marchilena
- Tags: Division I, Bishop Guertin, football, Londonderry, NH High School Sports Insider, slider, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-08-18 04:44

For one series Friday night, Jimmy Lauzon had a flashback to last year's Division I football championship game.

The Londonderry High School football team drove deep into Bishop Guertin territory on each of its first two drives, but had nothing on the scoreboard to show for it.

An interception in the end zone and a missed field goal kept it a scoreless game late in the first half, and when Cardinals' quarterback Matt Santusuosso broke free on their first play after the arrant kick, it looked like Bishop Guertin might jump out in front.

But as Santusuosso raced for the goal line, Londonderry's Seth Doyon was closing in and made a touchdown-saving tackle at the Lancers' 9-yard line. With four shots at the end zone from inside the 10, the Cardinals were unable to find a way in and turned the ball over on downs at the Lancers' 11-yard line.

"I’ve got to give credit to Seth Doyon," Lauzon said. "He had a great game. That’s a game-changing play. You best believe I’ll be talking about that one for a while. We had one last year in the championship. It’s that type of hustle that we preach and we want, and that’s what those guys do."

Three plays later, Drew Heenan connected with Andrew Kullman for an 81-yard touchdown, and after the Cardinals fumbled away the ensuing kick, Anthony Amaro ran in another score from 17-yard out to make it 14-0 Lancers. Londonderry held off Bishop Guertin for a 35-16 win in a battle of teams that were at the top of the D1 playoff standings heading into the game.

The Lancers twice held the Cardinals out of the end zone after they'd driven inside the 10 in the first half, and they not only held a 3-2 advantage on turnovers, they scored 14 points off their takeaways.

"That’s football in general and then it’s magnified more when you are playing a really good team," Bishop Guertin coach John Trisciani said. "It was definitely a situation where we needed to do some stuff on special teams and not have any issues there, and then win the turnover battle. It will keep you in games or it will end them fast. It’s a huge part of high school football for sure."

Watching Santusuosso get caught on the long run was something the Cardinals haven't been accustomed to this season, and against most other teams, Trisciani believed his quarterback would have scored.

Bishop Guertin also got down to the Londonderry 7-yard line at the end of the half, but couldn't score before time ran out.

"You see a lot of things magnified against those good teams," he said. "Against a team that’s not very good, you can make some mistakes. You can not necessarily execute your blocking assignments and your guy will still go. Here, it’s the slightest error, we miss a block or the execution isn’t there, signals get crossed up, and it’s blatantly obvious it’s not working."

It wasn't the first time this year Londonderry's defense has been able to stand up when its back was against the wall.

"(In Londonderry's win over) Concord, late in the game, they ran 12 plays from the 10," Lauzon said. "We stopped them, but we kept getting penalties.

"Our guys are tough to push around if they’re disciplined. And you know they’re hyper-focused on being disciplined down there and not letting anything up. It’s tough because they can throw it and run it down there."

After that second defensive stand, the Lancers took a 14-8 lead into the halftime, but it looked as if momentum was gone after an unsportsmanlike penalty and a hold on the first drive of the second left Londonderry facing a third-and-23 from its own 25.

Instead, Heenan found Jake Schena open coming out of the backfield and the junior took the completion 75 yards for a touchdown.

"You hope you’re not in third-and-23 or whatever it was, but we work on situations like that," Lauzon said. "Drew threw a great ball. You’ve got to pick your poison with Drew. He’s really good at picking up the blitz and stepping right into it and drilling the ball. But then you can sit back, but if your offensive line can protect long enough, someone gets open. It’s nice that he’s able to do both well.

"That was probably a backbreaker for them. You’ve got to respect the two receivers over there. They’re both really good. Someone has to pick Schena up out of the backfield."

The defense stepped up again after that, forcing turnovers on each of Bishop Guertin's next two possessions. The first, a fumble by Santusuosso that was recovered by Michael Sampson, led to an 8-yard touchdown pass from Heenan to Amaro that made it 28-8 with 4:16 left in the third quarter.

"The first thing, you’ve got to look in the mirror and see how you can handle some of those situations a little bit better," Trisciani said. "On a positive, I think the kids really battled. We’re having a really hard time with some injuries and we had some more guys get banged up in that game.

"Guys are at times being called upon to play out of position or in a spot they haven’t got a ton of reps in. It’s like a next-man-up mentality, but at the same time, sometimes you’re kind of running out of men. I’m really happy with the guys’ effort. The score doesn’t reflect it."