AUBURN – Hard to tell yet if this is a vintage Lawrence High School football team, but the defense is in the conversation with the best the Bulldogs have brandished during an extended run at the top of the Pine Tree Conference.
Progress is not measured by points permitted, in other words. Try yards allowed. Edward Little came up with 80 on Friday night at Walton Field. That wasn’t enough for the Red Eddies to get even a sniff of the hamburgers and fries simmering in the snack shack behind the end zone.
Lawrence walked off with its second straight shutout to christen the Eastern Class A campaign, 14-0.
“Last year we had quite a few seniors starting, but everybody who wasn’t starting could have started,” said Lawrence senior Mark Yandian, who registered two quarterback sacks and scored one of the Bulldogs’ two touchdowns. “They waited their turn. They were all on the (scout) team last year giving it their all, and they really came to play this year.”
The Eddies’ first drive of the night stalled at the Lawrence 31 after Teven Colon’s 41-yard return of the opening kickoff. Nobody in a maroon jersey imagined then that it would be the Eddies’ deepest drive of the night.
In fact, EL made only one additional sojourn past midfield. That was to the 47 on the next-to-last play of the first half. Yandian and Dylan Gannon promptly combined to drop Eddies QB Josh Delong and deny even a Hail Mary attempt.
Hope stayed alive until juniors Alex Leathers and Bryant Wade hooked up for a 31-yard TD pass with 1:39 remaining in the fourth quarter. Wade, a tight end, ran a post pattern into double coverage and timed his jump perfectly on fourth-and-5.
“We played with what was ranked the No. 3 team in the state,” said EL coach Dave Sterling. “We’ve showed that we can play with just about anybody we line up with. We’ll come together as a team and play better next week.”
EL dropped to 0-2 with its second hard-fought loss to a recent PTC power. Brunswick edged the Eddies 21-20 on their home field last week. The Eddies have dropped 10 of their last 11, dating back to the 2008 PTC title game.
Lawrence, which shut out Brewer in its opener, has lost only one regular-season conference game in the last five years under EL alumnus John Hersom.
“I think we had confidence preseason,” said Lawrence senior lineman Lucas Quimby. “We’ve been watching upperclassmen who were talented. We learned from them and just grew because of them.”
The Eddies were nearly the Bulldogs’ equal defensively, particularly as Lawrence inched closer to the goal line. EL stopped three drives inside the 20-yard line, including one at the 5.
Fourth-down gambles produced both Lawrence touchdowns.
With the Eddies’ gang-tackling resistance focused heavily on Lawrence senior tailback Blair Blaisdell (27 carries, 122 yards) in the second quarter, the Bulldogs ran a counter play with Yandian on fourth-and-4 from the 11.
Yandian started left, cut back through the middle and slipped through three different swipes at his feet for a score.
Blaisdell’s kick failed for a 6-0 margin that stood until late in the game.
“We got close there a couple of times, and we really wanted to get into the end zone,” Yandian said. “We had a nice play call there. They were over-pursuing on that side. Nice hole, nice blocking.”
Derrick Giggey’s blocked punt after a low snap launched Lawrence’s next drive at the EL 13, but the Eddies held.
Colon and Luke Farrago made solo stops of Blaisdell on third and fourth down. Farrago had a hand in 18 tackles on the night. Colon contributed to nine.
“We run a multiple-front defense. We’re able to put kids in different positions, and they’re doing really well,” Sterling said. “I’m very happy with they way we played defensively.”
EL simply couldn’t get that defense off the field in the second half, running 17 plays to Lawrence’s 35 for three net yards.
Lawrence contained Colon to 53 yards on 13 carries.
Another errant snap resulted in a punt of minus-one yard and shortened the field for Lawrence’s insurance touchdown. Still, EL silenced Blaisdell and Shaun Carroll on three straight carries before Wade’s leaping catch.
“(We needed) just one break. Up until those final seconds when they put that last touchdown on, we played very well to stay in the game,” Sterling said. “We’ve just got to make better opportunities for ourselves.”
Cory Spruill, Avery Jackson and Zach Leblond also starred defensively for the Eddies. Giggey was the leading tackler for Lawrence.
“Our defense is just naturally strong,” Quimby said. “Our offense we had some good drives put together but couldn’t really finish, so our defense needed to be there, and it was.”
koakes@sunjournal.com
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