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Gloucester football makes up for last two years, rolls past Beverly

Saturday, September, 22 By Matt Langone
Sports editor

BEVERLY | Gloucester High School football captain Andrew Fulford and his fellow seniors had never tasted victory on the varsity level against Beverly.

The Fishermen had a chance to finally get that elusive win against the Panthers on Saturday afternoon at Hurd Stadium, and it's safe to say that Gloucester played like a team with revenge on its mind.

Led by an inspired three-touchdown performance from Fulford, Gloucester rolled to a 34-7 victory to improve to 3-0 on the season. The Fishermen lost to Beverly last year (20-18) when they were stuffed three consecutive times on the goal line, preventing them from scoring a potential game-winning touchdown. In 2005, the Panthers crushed Gloucester 33-14.

"This is the first win over Beverly for our seniors, so this is a pretty special moment," said Fulford, who rushed for a game-high 120 yards on 17 carries. "It was a 100-percent team effort. When we play as a cohesive unit, we're hard to beat."

Gloucester head coach Paul Ingram agreed with the sentiment that history played a role in Gloucester's performance.

"The kids were upset with the outcome of last year's game," Ingram said. "I guess you would have to say revenge was on their mind. I think someone reminded them about that loss last year."

The marquee matchup going into the contest was between Beverly's star running back Greg Pierce and the Gloucester defensive front seven. Pierce was coming off two straight games of over 200 yards rushing, but was limited to just 31 yards on just 15 carries against the stingy Fishermen. As a whole, the Beverly offense could only muster up 103 yards and three first downs.

"Gloucester has really good team speed and they know how to get to the point of attack," said Beverly coach Dan Bauer, whose team fell to 1-2. "Quite honestly, rhythm and momentum are needed for an offense, and we didn't have a whole lot of plays in the first half. So getting that rhythm and balance was tough."

While Gloucester's defense held the Beverly offense to three-and-out on back-to-back possessions to start the game, the Fishermen were clicking on all cylinders with a punishing ground game. Fulford capped off a six-play drive on Gloucester's first possession with a 3-yard touchdown run. On their next possession, the Fishermen started with the ball on the Beverly 34-yard line due to a poor Beverly punt into the wind. Fulford finished that four-play drive with a 1-yard TD.

Sophomore back Taylor Burbine (seven rushes, 81 yards) added his first of two touchdowns with 4:57 left in the second quarter on a 14-yard run to make the score 21-0. Beverly would respond on the ensuing kickoff with a 79-yard return for a score by Pierce, but that was not nearly enough to sway the game's momentum.