GREAT BARRINGTON — Frontier Regional owned the trenches and won a battle of attrition in besting Monument Mountain, 33-0, on Friday night.
The Red Hawks hit the ground running, literally, dominating the line of scrimmage in the first half. The Hawks scored on a pair of 12-play drives to stake themselves a 14-0 advantage with 8 minutes, 36 seconds to go in the second quarter.
Frontier took the opening kickoff and took 12 plays — 11 rushes — to travel 80 yards into the Spartan end zone. Ito McMillan, who finished with 132 yards on the ground and three total touchdowns, punched in the ice-breaker from 7-yards out with 6:36 on the first-quarter clock.
It was a strong statement from a team that managed just one score in a tight opening loss last week.
“We worked some things out this week, moved some people around, but I think we got some good chemistry going today, it worked pretty good,” Frontier coach Don Gordon said. “That’s what we like, everybody doing their job.”
A holding penalty stalled Monument’s opening drive, and Frontier took the punt at its own 14. From there, it was another 12 running plays before Josh Semaski barreled into the end zone for another touchdown. Frontier racked up 11 first downs on its first two drives. Monument Mountain, on the other hand, had just six until its final drive of the game.
Despite the final score, the Spartans were far from out of it down 14-0. The offense got excellent field position off a Frontier punt later in the second quarter.
The Spartans rode Jack O’Brien and Ashton Aloisi into the red zone and down to the 6-yard line with a minute to go before the half. With no timeouts remaining, things got rushed, and O’Brien’s two tries from the 4 were both stuffed by Frontier, the second of which came on fourth down as time expired.
“Just taking care of business,” Gordon said. “Everybody has a responsibility. Down linemen filled the gaps, linebackers came up, played with emotion. That’s what you need.”
The Red Hawks survived into the half and kept right on chugging to open the third. After a failed onside kick, Frontier went 52 yards in 10 plays to get McMillan his second score and the 20-0 lead.
Monument faced a fourth-and-1 on its own 33, electing to punt with 5:30 left in the third. The kick sailed into McMillan’s arms at the Frontier 29. The senior speedster burst through the first line of gunners and broke to the left sideline, before blasting the rest of his 71 yards to the end zone for the back-breaker.
Semaski scored once more in the third quarter after a fumble recovery set up a short field. Jack Vecellio got to the quarterback on Monument’s next drive and John Semaski came away with the loose ball. Josh Semaski capped his 92-yard day with a 9-yard scoring plunge.
Frontier Regional 33,
Monument Mountain 0
|
Frontier |
7 |
7 |
19 |
0 |
—33 |
|
Monument |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
—0 |
First quarter
F — Ito McMillan 7 run (Dylan Apanell kick), 6:36.
Second Quarter
F — Josh Semaski 7 run (Apanell kick), 8:36.
Third Quarter
F — McMillan 6 run (Nick Henderson block), 8:01.
F — McMillan 71 punt return (kick no good), 5:11.
F — Semaski 9 run (Apanell kick), 1:56.
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
RUSHING — F: Ito McMillan 12-132, Josh Semaski 13-92, Garrett DeForest 4-29, Alec Kirkendall 3-12, Jack Vecellio 1-2; MM: Jack O’Brien 17-79, Ashton Aloisi 11-54, Reece Mullen 4-25, Ty Duquette 1-5, Hunter DeGrenier 1-3, Nick Henderson 1-4.
PASSING — F: DeForest 1-1-0 13; MM: DeGrenier 2-5-0 17.
RECEIVING — F: Donovan Hoffman 1-13; MM: Aloisi 2-17