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# Milford, Souhegan meet with playoff hopes at stake
- URL: https://www.nh-highschoolsports.com/milford-souhegan-meet-with-playoff-hopes-at-stake/
- Published: 2011-10-14T10:00:31.000Z
- Updated: 2011-10-14T10:00:31.000Z
- Description: While the top four high school football teams in Division III are beating up on each other this weekend, Milford and Souhegan will be playing a game of survival.
- Author: Joe Marchilena
- Tags: Division III-IV, Fall Sports, Division III, football, Milford, Souhegan, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-08-18 04:44

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/bc/58/bc5866d0-9fd9-4113-b959-670d6f16471d/content/images/www-nh-highschoolsports-com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/mshshsfball1015-lines1.jpg "MSHSHSfball1015 lines1")

While the top four high school football teams in Division III are beating up on each other this weekend, Milford and Souhegan will be playing a game of survival.

The Spartans and the Sabers are on the outside looking in right now – fifth and sixth, respectively, in the standings – and a loss for either one could be the beginning of the end of what has been quite a run for both teams.

Since moving up from Division IV before the start of the 2004, Milford (2-2 in division) has made the playoffs every year, including a cracking the championship game stranglehold that Souhegan, Plymouth and Portsmouth have had in that same season.

Meanwhile, Souhegan (1-3) has not missed the postseason in 15 years, winning four championships in that time.

Playoffs without one team – or even both – would be strange. The teams will kick off in Milford at 7 p.m. Friday, while Goffstown (4-0) and Portsmouth (4-0) also battle on the seacoast Friday and Hollis/Brookline (4-0) heads to Bedford (4-1) on Saturday.

“It’s a big game because both programs know that it has playoff implications (for both),” Souhegan coach Mike Beliveau said. “For the team that wins, they’re still breathing, and for the team that doesn’t win, the road just got extremely long.”

A loss for Souhegan would make that road nearly impossible to overcome. If the Sabers were to win out after that, they’d need a lot of help from the rest of the division to end up fourth. A Milford loss would be less detrimental, but coach Keith Jones certainly isn’t telling his kids that.

“It’s like do-or-die for both teams,” he said. “We’ve got Goffstown and Hollis/Brookline after this, so we certainly can’t afford to drop another one.”

Souhegan has won every meeting between the two teams with one exception – the Spartans handed the Sabers their only loss during the 2009 season, a year in which Souhegan won the division championship.

For Milford to pull out another win over Souhegan, it’s going to need to avoid the momentum swings it gave up in last week’s 49-6 loss to Bedford.

“Momentum is a huge part of high school football,” Jones said. “It’s tough to regroup and we just kept making mistakes and the snowball kept rolling.”

Beliveau knows that Souhegan, which picked up its first division win against Pembroke last week, needs to get out in front early and force Milford to do the things it isn’t always comfortable doing.

“We got a fast start last week, and can we get off to a fast start,” Beliveau said. “I’m sure what they’re hoping to do is use that strong run game to move the chains and control clock. That’s not to say they don’t have an experienced passer in Bud Theriault. He’s got a good arm, he’s tall, he has some zip on his pass, he is accurate. But that’s what Milford does. They’re going to run the ball.”

After years of being the favorite, Souhegan is the underdog and Beliveau is hoping that his team has a few surprises left for the division.

“Right now as a program, we’re just trying to get better every day,” he said. “We’re just laying in the weeds and we hope that we emerge from the weeds and peak at the right time. No time really to peak than the present.”