Former Falcons help Anna Maria to first win

Brenden Soares
Posted 11/12/15

The Anna Maria football team finally had something to celebrate last Saturday, as a strong defensive effort – including key contributions from a pair of Cranston West products – provided …

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Former Falcons help Anna Maria to first win

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The Anna Maria football team finally had something to celebrate last Saturday, as a strong defensive effort – including key contributions from a pair of Cranston West products – provided the cornerstone to a 24-20 upending of Gallaudet.

The Amcats snapped a 20-game losing streak that stretched back to 2013, and in so doing, also obtained the school’s first-ever win over the Bison in the teams’ seventh all-time meeting.

Anna Maria’s victory came with an extra layer of poignancy for ex-Falcon Tyler Rocha, who is preparing for his final collegiate game this weekend.

The defensive end had a solid afternoon, compiling nine tackles along with a sack of Gallaudet quarterback Ramon Johnson at the end of the first quarter.

Not to be outdone, Stefano Marziale was also at the heart of the action for the Amcats, coming up with a career-high seven tackles, with 2 1/2 of those stops resulting in a loss of yards for the Bison.

The breakthrough performance was a just reward for Marziale’s perseverance in recent years, as the junior has recently earned a starting role at linebacker to go along with his pre-existing punting duties.

The swan song to the Amcats’ 2015 campaign and Rocha’s college football career comes this Saturday, as the team will bid for consecutive wins for the first time since 2011 against a Becker team fresh off a 35-21 win over Castleton in which the Hawks posted 562 yards of total offense.

Allen leads River Hawks to America East title

Although he was unable to finish first, Cranston West graduate Bobby Allen was still able to taste the thrill of victory on Halloween as he led UMass-Lowell’s cross country team to the America East championship.

Allen crossed the line as the runner-up to Maryland-Baltimore County’s Hassan Omar, traversing the eight-kilometer course in 24 minutes, 48.81 seconds.

The ex-Falcon was one of three River Hawk harriers that finished inside the top 10, while the squad’s two other scoring runners finished in 11th and 16th, respectively.

With that strength in depth on display, the UMass-Lowell squad made sure that last year’s heartbreaking second-place finish to Binghamton became a thing of the past.

In the end, the final margin of victory wasn’t as close as the three points that separated the Bearcats from the River Hawks in 2014; UMass-Lowell took the crown with 42 points, with host Stony Brook finishing second with 74.

The victory was also a symbolic one for the UMass-Lowell athletics program as a whole, as it marked the first conference championship won by the school in any sport since its move to Division I in 2013.

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