We start with the carnage up at Rentschler Field for the Class LL championship game.
Xavier, top-ranked and unbeaten Xavier, made a strong case for holding on to its No. 1 ranking with a thunderous 24-13 victory over Trumbull in the Class LL state championship game.
Mike Mastroianni ran for 279 yards and two touchdowns, Pat D’Amato and Kosi Broderick hooked up four times for 162 yards and a touchdown, and the Xavier defense held Trumbull to 26 yards rushing and intercepted three passes en route to its second straight championship.
Xavier’s offensive and defensive lines were the show. That’s all Trumbull could talk about afterward, leading to this great quote from Trumbull junior FB/RB Don Cherry (who had himself a fine day in defeat with 15 tackles and a touchdown), “”If you were out there you’d see that they move like robots. They all move in sync. It was tough dealing with those almost robotic linemen. …They were the best line we’ve seen all year.”
So Xavier stated it’s case emphatically, “I think we made a pretty good statement about that tonight,” coach Sean Marinan said.
He was joined by many (perhaps all) of the SCC aficionados and cheerleaders, who joined Xavier in wagging their index fingers into the air and in cyberspace.
Still three more to go, particularly the one game that may (or may not) have an effect on the No. 1 vote: The Class L championship game between New Canaan and Masuk. That kicks off at 3 p.m. today.
It’s preceded by the Class M final between Hillhouse and New London at 11 a.m. and proceeded by the Class S championship between St. Joseph and Ansonia at 7 p.m.
Live Blog is Below. Share with us your thoughts on all of Friday’s and Saturday’s action during and after the games.
Apologies for last night’s live broadcasts. I misspoke that the games would be shown on video feeds. Only audio was available (and even that apparently shorted out). I’m sure they’ll give it another shot. You can listen to the games and watch the live blog here .
If that doesn’t work, you can also catch “The Coach” George DeMaio and Nick Aprea, who will take you through all of the remaining action on WELI 960-AM (weli.com).
Or you can watch the CIAC’s live stat tracker here: Class M | Class L | Class S
<a href=”http://www.coveritlive.com/mobile.php/option=com_mobile/task=viewaltcast/altcast_code=0e4167a1bf” mce_href=”http://www.coveritlive.com/mobile.php/option=com_mobile/task=viewaltcast/altcast_code=0e4167a1bf” >High School Football Live Scoring Updates</a>
Powerful win by Xavier. Did not think Trumbull played very well. Game turned on that first Milne INT where his receiver was wide open for an easy score but pass was way short. Then Trumbull lost its defensive focus and gave up that 70 yard pass play on the next series. Huge momentum swing … instead of a potential 14-10 Trumbull lead, it was 17-7 Xavier. Other than that teams traded the turf and mistakes. But Xavier’s O-line was outstanding.
Xavier made it happen and likely retains state-wide #1 vote. Only thing Masuk could do is demolish NC like 41-0 (a’la Darien) and make a case that their offense couldn’t be stopped by anyone and their defense is every bit as good as Xavier’s. Tall order – NC is good.
JB — I agree with your analysis 100%. Trumbull would have had to play an “A+” game in order to beat Xavier, and they were not able to do that.
I thought the whole atmosphere at Rentschler was great — field conditions appeared to be OK, and would think the players thought it was cool to play there.
Sean — a question/suggestion: next year, is there any way for, say, CPTV to televise the games, even if was just on Saturday? I would think they could also put together a nice “studio show” between games where coaches not playing could give some analysis. I think it would have been interesting to hear from guys like Steve Fillipone, Marce Petroccio, etc. as to their take on the games.
I say that because if they are going to continue to play the games at Rentschler, you know they have a great infrastructure in place in order to televise the games. Just a thought…