RallyNorth.net

Manchester Memorial Crusaders Football '08

Fri, Sep 19, 2008 07:00 PM @ Salem
Team Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Final
Manchester Memorial 6 8 6 0 20
Salem 6 30 23 6 65

Salem runs to a record against Memorial

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Saturday, September, 20 By Mike McMahon
Staff writer

SALEM, N.H. — Salem head coach Jack Gati challenged his running backs after a disappointing performance last week against Londonderry, and his players responded. The Blue Devils rushed for 431 yards and trounced Manchester Memorial, 65-20 at Grant Field.

According to Salem football historian Bernie Campbell, the Blue Devils’ 65 points is a school record. In Campbell’s record books, which go back to 1965, the previous high was a 64-0 win over Somersworth in 1971.

“We needed something like that,” said Gati, whose team improved to 2-1.

The highlight was senior Chris Najem, who rushed for 150 yards on just nine carries, an average of 16.67, to go along with three trips to the end zone.

“He’s the one that really needed to step up tonight,” Gati said of Najem, who had just 23 yards last week and 118 in the first two games combined. “He had been inconsistent and had a really long week of practice, all of the backs did. We need him to be consistent, and tonight he was. He’s a powerful runner, and we need him to play the way that he did tonight.”

Najem, whose power style compliments the speedy Max Jacques (14 carries, 98 yards and a touchdown), felt like the offense finally gelled.

“We had to step it up after last week,” he said. “Like coach said, we needed this. Everything just came together tonight. We switched it up in the backfield because we had a lot of backs that can do different things. We have guys who can block, speedy guys who can go to the outside and pickup big gains, and then guys who can smash you up the middle and punch it in. We can attack a lot of different ways and we did everything tonight. It just came together.”

Added Gati on the complimenting styles of Jacques and Najem, “Max sets up a lot for us. He’s the speed guy. Then you can throw a different weapon at them with Najem and some of our other more powerful backs. And if (Matt) Cannone throws the ball the way he did today it really keeps the defense honest.”

Cannone, Salem’s sophomore quarterback, didn’t have to throw the ball much, but when he did, he made it count. The Blue Devils amassed 524 yards of offense despite throwing the ball just three times. Cannone hooked up with receiver Chris Lavalle twice, for touchdown catches of 42 and 51 yards.

“He’s an impressive kid,” Gati said. “He has really matured the last couple of weeks. He’s so composed for a sophomore, and I think that’s probably his best quality. He executes, and he made some huge plays tonight, and he executes because of his composure.”

Next week, Salem will face one of its toughest tests of the season when they travel to Pinkerton. The Astros also beat up on Memorial to the tune of 41-6 last week. Rob Rodgers, Memorial’s crushing senior running back, ran for 72  yards against the Astros, but the Blue Devils held him to just 39.

“Every game is different, so the comparisons of our game and their game against these guys doesn’t mean much,” said Gati. “Knowing that we have Pinkerton next week, we really needed this type of game. Our objective was to block well up front and just let our backs loose.”

Game Statistics:

First Quarter

MM — Chris Hynes 7 run (kick failed), 6:03

S — Max Jacques 26 run (kick failed) 1:51

Second Quarter

S — Chris Najem 31 run (Matt Cannone run), 8:54

S — Kyle Kenney 1 run (Darren Brown pass from Cannone), 7:15

S — Cory Lavallee 51 pass from Cannone (Jacques run), 4:03

MM — Cody Quinn 0 fumble recovery (Domingo Cruz run), 1:15

S — Lavallee 42 pass from Cannone (run failed)

 

Third Quarter

S — Najem 8 run (Brown pass from Cannone), 9:54

MM — Cruz 6 pass from Hynes (pass failed), 7:40

S — Najem 4 run (Najem run), 6:04

S — Mike DiPalma 2 run (Lavallee kick), 0:00

 

Fourth Quarter

S — Chris Hale 0 fumble recovery (no PAT), 0:00

 


INDIVIDUAL LEADERS

RUSHING: S (48-431) — Chris Najem 9-150, Max Jacques 14-98, Kyle Kenney 8-59, Mike DiPalma 5-50, Darren Brown 5-36, Mike Rocheleau 2-15, Jerrickson Federick 1-7, Mike Anderson 1-6, Alex Sobrado 1-5, Rob Mairs 1-4, Matt Cannone 1-(-3); MM (30-126) — Chris Hynes 10-85, Rob Rodgers 11-39, Domingo Cruz 7-2, Lucas Reynolds 1-0, Fred Rodgers 1-0

PASSING: S — Matt Cannone 2-3-0, 93;  MM — Chris Hynes 8-16-1, 50; Frank Rogers 1-1-0, 2

RECEIVING: S — Cory Lavallee 2-93; MM — Domingo Cruz 3-26, Cody Quinn 3-12, Mike Alaimo 1-6, Julian Alonso 1-6, Eddie Veins 1-2

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