GRAY — Quality trumped quantity when Spruce Mountain and Gray-New Gloucester met on the gridiron Friday night.
The Patriots ran 39 plays to the Phoenix’s 16, but Spruce Mountain scored on four of them, jumping out to a 30-0 lead and running away with a 51-6 victory in a Class C South football game at Myles Burbank Memorial Field.
The Phoenix (2-2) went long-distance to score all of their first-half touchdowns. Caulin Parker ran a quarterback keeper for 40 yards to paydirt on the visitors’ opening drive, then hooked up with Austin Darling for a 55-yard TD pass on a one-play drive.
Darling ran for scores of 30 and 55 yards in the second quarter. Dylan Webster ran for the two-point conversion on the first three drives, and Spruce Mountain missed an extra-point on the fourth score.
“Everyone came together and did their job, and that led to us executing the plays and making the plays when we needed,” Parker said. “The offensive line did great. They were the key to our success. They blocked the guys they needed to block and it opened up great holes for the backfield.”
“It makes a big difference having Caulin, Austin and Dillon in the backfield together,” Phoenix coach Walter Polky said. “It’s just execution, that’s what it is.”
Darling’s TD catch and second TD run both came on single-play drives. He finished with seven carries for 138 yards and two catches for 70 yards.
“It’s great to watch Austin. He’s really quick, fast, he’s speedy,” Parker said. “It’s great to watch him get out in the open field and do what he can do.”
The Phoenix getting out into the open field is what doomed the Patriots (0-4).
“They had a lot more speed than us,” Gray-NG coach Mark Renna said. “We’re pretty big, but we’re slow. They’re fast, they’re athletic. They were way more athletic than us tonight. Way, way more athletic.
“That’s a good team over there. We tried to slow the game down, but they scored on three plays like two different times. They’re lightning.”
The Patriots tried to grind the game down. They ran on 30 of their 39 first-half plays, but for minimal gains — or losses — on most of them.
Webster (7 yards), Kayle Stewart (38 yards) and Bret Duval (18 yards) all scored on TD runs in the second half for Spruce Mountain, which took a 51-0 lead.
Gray-New Gloucester got on the scoreboard late in its homecoming game when Boomer Simmons went 65 yards up the right sideline to cap off a one-play drive. It was also the last offensive play for the Patriots. Simmons ran 21 times for 133 yards in a workhorse effort for the hosts.
“He is a great kid,” Renna said. “He gives 110 percent every time. That kid’s a trooper. He is our team, he is our heart and soul right now.”
Both coaches said they have teams searching for identities. The Phoenix might have found their’s Friday night, which is trying to get to the sidelines and fly using the speed of Darling, Parker, Stewart and Brett Frey.
The Patriots have a tough competitor and a lot of inexperience. Three of the four players in the Gray-NG secondary are freshmen, and Renna said he trotted out six first-year players on defense and four on offense.
“We’re not good yet,” Renna said. “Hopefully we’ll work there, we’ll see what happens.”
Spruce Mountain scored 50-plus points a week after giving up 50-plus points. The Phoenix had their best week of practice this week, thanks to a bad taste left in their mouth from the blowout loss to Cape Elizabeth.
“Going down there and to play like we did, that’s why this week we were very, very focused,” Polky said. “We have a chance to do some really good things.”
wkramlich@sunjournal.com
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