Hawks power past Patriots, improve to 5-0

By Matt Metcalf
Posted 10/25/16

It was business as usual for the Hendricken football team coming off a bye to face arguably its toughest league test to date on Friday night at Portsmouth. Some teams come off of their bye week playing a bit sluggish, but

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Hawks power past Patriots, improve to 5-0

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It was business as usual for the Hendricken football team coming off a bye to face arguably its toughest league test to date on Friday night at Portsmouth.

Some teams come off of their bye week playing a bit sluggish, but that wasn’t the case for the Hawks, as they turned in maybe their most impressive all-around effort of the season, rolling past the Patriots, 54-14, to lock up the Division I-A crown.

“We talked about it a lot this week, that’s one of our goals,” Hendricken head coach Keith Croft said of securing the regular season title. “Our first goal is to get into the playoffs and then chronological order, win a division title. It was a good win tonight. That’s a good team.”

Hendricken’s defense set the tone early, forcing a quick three-and-out from Portsmouth on the first possession of the game.

A few plays later, the Hawks were in the end zone. Just over three minutes into the first quarter, Chris Hindle found his favorite target, Andrew Hopgood, who reeled in a pass and took it 35 yards to give the Hawks a 6-0 lead.

Roughly six minutes later, Hendricken’s senior duo connected again, with Hindle dropping in a perfect pass over coverage and into the hands of Hopgood for a 58-yard touchdown. Andrew Flint’s extra point pushed the advantage out to 13-0.

And Hopgood wasn’t done there.

On the ensuing possession, Portsmouth took the ball to near midfield before it was faced with a fourth-and-1. After talking it over at the end of the first quarter, the Patriots decided to go for it on the first play of the second quarter, but the decision proved to be costly.

Portsmouth quarterback Sean Coyne’s short pass was read perfectly by Hopgood, who intercepted the ball and took it to the end zone for his third score in less than a 10-minute span.

“I think he’s been great,” Croft said about Hopgood. “To be honest, I’m waiting for a college coach to see how talented he is because I really think there are a lot of colleges that are missing the boat on him. He’s a tremendous kid, a tremendous worker and I just can’t say enough about him.”

Other players would get in on the action shortly after.

With 8:02 to go in the first half, running back Matt DiTondo darted through Portsmouth’s defensive line and cruised to an 86-yard score, making it 27-0.

Later in the half, Portsmouth forced Hendricken into a fourth-and-10 at the Patriots’ 24-yard line, but the home team just couldn’t come up with a stop.

Hindle scrambled around before running himself, taking it 24 yards to the end zone to push the lead to 34-0.

Portsmouth would respond with its first score of the game prior to the half, though.

With 25 seconds remaining in the first half, Coyne heaved a deep pass to Brian Hamilton for a 57-yard touchdown to trim the Patriots’ deficit to 34-7 going into the break.

However, out of halftime, it didn’t take long for Hendricken to add to its already insurmountable lead.

On the first play from scrimmage, Kwity Paye used a ferocious stiff arm to spring an 80-yard touchdown.

DiTondo and Devin Rivet would also add rushing scores in the third quarter to increase the advantage to 54-7.

Portsmouth added a touchdown on the last play of the game, as Kyle Bicho found Coyne in the end zone to bring the final to 54-14.

The extra week of rest and preparation certainly paid off for the now 5-0 Hawks, who have now scored 110 points in their last two games.

“You always go into the bye week cautious, not knowing if you want a bye week now, but our guys came out fresh and we had extra time to game plan for them,” Croft said. “Portsmouth is a tough team to game plan for. We worked on conditioning, got some strength back and the guys were flying around tonight. So, I think it was good. The bye came at a good time.”

Hendricken will look to keep things rolling when it hosts winless Woonsocket on Friday at 7 p.m.

“I don’t want them to take anything for granted,” Croft said. “We’re going to get right back to work and start preparing for Woonsocket.”

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