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Londonderry falls 7 yards short

Friday, September, 02 By Jeff Hamrick

MILFORD, N.H. — In its season opener, Londonderry opened quickly and finished ferociously.

In between, however, the Lancers were stagnant.

As a result, Division 1 Londonderry dropped a 13-6 decision to Division 3 Milford.

The Lancers went 65 yards and scored on Vinny Parilla’s 2-yard run on the game’s first possession. Then after a couple of quality fourth-quarter defensive stands, they went 80 yards on their last possession which ended on downs at the Milford 7 with 13 seconds left.

Those two drives, though, accounted for 145 of Londonderry’s 193 total yards of offense, and for exactly half of its 36 plays from scrimmage.

“The elephant in the room is that our offensive execution wasn’t where it should have been,” said Londonderry coach Jon Rich, whose club will be without All-Star back Sean O’Gorman (suspension) for the first several games. “So, we’re going to look at film and figure out why that was. We’ll correct those mistakes and we’re going to move forward.”

It was Milford who was moving ahead most of the game. The Spartans, a semifinalist in last year’s Division 3 playoffs, answered Londonderry’s opening gambit, going 59 yards on 11 running plays on their ensuing possession to take a 7-6 lead. Kyle Higgins, who ran for a game-high 85 yards on 19 carries capped the drive on a 1-yard run.

“We were a little surprised how fast they came out,” said Parilla, who split time between running back and wide receiver in Londonderry’s single-wing offense.

Milford capped the night’s scoring on its third possession. It appeared the Lancers would dodge a bullet as linebacker Dan Kinnon stripped Higgins on the 2, but Boyd Theriault picked up the loose ball and ran it in for a 1-yard score on the final play of the half.

The Lancers ran a mere three plays — all incomplete passes — in the second quarter. At intermission, the Spartans had run 22 more plays than Londonderry, which gained 55 of its 68 first-half yards on runs by Connor Richard (38 yards) and Michael Wiedenfeld (17).

“That’s the goal to beat any team is if you can keep them off the field,” Milford coach Keith Jones said. “I don’t think they ran many plays. That was part of the game plan was 3 yards, a cloud of dust and keep the chains moving.”

Milford twice threatened in the fourth, but Londonderry finally made a stand, stopping the Spartans on downs at the 1 and at the 13. After the second stop with 2:27 left, the Lancers offense finally got untracked. Troy Ward had a key 10-yard run on fourth-and-one, and Dylan Cole completed four passes, including a 29-yarder to Parilla, who made a nice leaping catch at the 11 with less than a minute remaining.

Three incompletions and a 4-yard run, however, left the Lancers 7 yards shy with 13 seconds remaining.