Nashua North football hangs on to beat Manchester Memorial

NASHUA – The third quarter belongs to the Nashua High School North football team.

In its season-opening win, the Titans broke open a tie game with Alvirne in the quarter on the way to a 38-7 win.

On Saturday, North trailed Manchester Memorial 3-0 at halftime, but scored all of its 22 points in the third quarter and held off the Crusaders late to win 22-17 at Stellos Stadium.

Demitri Jackson led North (1-0 in Division I, 2-0 overall) with 151 yards rushing and two touchdowns, including a 54-yard scoring run, and Colby Gunter completed 6 of 12 passes for 112 yards, 40 of which came on a touchdown pass to Gus Barroso that got the Titans on the board.

“Gus on the deep ball got things going for us,” North coach Jason Robie said. “I’m so proud of our guys because that was a character win. We were down at halftime and we hung in there and battled back. There were a lot of young kids out there playing football and I was very pleased with those efforts.”

The humidity caused several North players to cramp up and the Titans were forced to expand their rotation on both sides of the ball.

Memorial (0-1, 1-1) made a late charge, scoring twice in the fourth quarter to cut the lead to five. But after scoring to make it 22-17 with 1:45, the Crusaders failed to recover the onside kick and Jackson broke off a 52-yard run inside the Memorial 5-yard line to ice the win.

Stephen Deane was 18 of 33 passing for 219 yards with a touchdown and an interception, and he also scored on a 1-yard run, to lead Memorial. Pierre Noel caught eight of Deane’s passes for 102 yards, while Deon Ball had five catches for 68 yards and a score.

While Memorial was putting up yards through the air, the Crusaders’ ground game was going nowhere, picking up 59 yards on 33 carries on the day.

“We were trying to hang our hat on stopping the run and we did that,” Robie said. “There were two interceptions that we dropped. There were a number of passes broken up. There was the one big interception. At the end of the game, we’re playing a little soft and giving up things that we shouldn’t be giving up. We’ll be working on that in practice.”

North’s defense got a big game from linebacker Deric Wagner, who broke up a couple of passes and made several plays in the Memorial backfield.

“He’s got a nose for the football,” Robie said. “He has good instincts. It’s not by chance. He studies film, he studies his opponent. He really is a student of the game and he wants to be better. He’s made that very evident in the offseason and watching him the first two weeks here.”

North had great field position throughout the first half, with its own 44 as its average starting point. The Titans began three of those first-half drives inside Memorial territory, but had nothing to show for it.

It wasn’t until North’s first drive of the second half that the offense got going, thanks in part to Barroso.

On second-and-9, Barroso picked up 22 yards on the ground to put the Titans at midfield. Two plays later, he picked up another 14 yards, but the play was called back on a hold.

After Gunter hit Myles Cassin-Reed for a 6-yard gain and a first down, the sophomore quarterback found Barroso all alone down the visitor’s sideline for a 40-yard touchdown pass that gave North a 7-3 lead with 8:28 left in the third.

Memorial went three-and-out on its next possession and the Titans didn’t waste any time putting more points on the board. Jackson took a direct snap, burst through a hole and raced 54 yards to the end zone. With Kyle Regan, who kicks for the Titans, cramping up, North went for two and got it to lead 15-3.

The Crusaders drove down to the North 25 on their next possession, but turned the ball over on downs. And Memorial’s next drive ended on an interception by North’s Christian Filonow, who returned it to the Memorial 2. Jackson rumbled into the end zone on the next play and Regan’s kick made it 22-3.

Deane finally got Memorial back in the game, ending a seven-play, 55-yard drive with a 1-yard touchdown run. After that, North twice had the ball in the Crusaders’ end, but turned the ball over on downs both times.

Memorial capitalized after the second stalled North drive, as Deane hit Noel for a 38-yard gain to get inside the Titians’ 25. Two players later, Deane completed a short pass to Ball, who danced through the secondary for 24 yards to the end zone with under two minutes to play.

But North was able to close out the win, thanks to Jackson’s big run on the final drive.

“We were down and we came back and we held on,” Robie said. “It’s a great win.”