PORTLAND — The Massabesic football team closed out their season by dropping a heartbreaker 27-16 to Deering at Memorial Stadium on Friday night.
“We came ready to play. We tried to win this game but what we’ve done over the last three weeks is we’ve improved so much as a team that we’re really happy about that,” said Massabesic head coach Eric Ouellette. “I think the future is going to be very bright for our guys. Only two seniors played in this game for us. I think we’re going to focus on that and get ready for next season and use this as motivation going into next year.”
The Mustangs opened up the scoring early in the second quarter.
At the 11:56 mark of the second, Owen Roberts scored from 4 yards out and the junior standout would also add the two-point conversion to produce an 8-0 score.
The Rams would answer back quickly. With 10:27 left in the second quarter, Travis Soule broke off a 41-yard touchdown run. Max Morrione kicked the extra point to create an 8-7 score.
The Mustangs would look to score again in the last minute of the first half. After a personal foul was called on Deering, Massabesic received the ball at the 10-yard line. Junior QB Nick Roberge passed the ball to Ethan Roy who was tackled at the 1. With 16 seconds left in the first half, Roberge tried to get the ball into the end zone but came up inches shorts when the clock ran out.
“We moved the ball, we just didn’t capitalize. We were on the 1-yard line and didn’t score. We were in the red zone a few times and didn’t score. Those are things that you can’t come back from. We were there, we had opportunities and we just didn’t finish them,” said Ouellette.
With 9:05 left in the third quarter, the Rams would take their first lead. A Massabesic pass was intercepted by Wenston Dinizo, who returned the ball 76 yards to the house to produce a 13-8 score.
At the 1:19 mark in third quarter, the Mustangs would take the lead back. Roberts scored his second touchdown of the night — again from 4 yards out — to create a 16-13 score.
“One thing that we’ve emphasized over the last three weeks is our offensive line and them playing hard and they did. We have a young group and they grinded. We had some good play by Ethan Roy, he made big catches for us which we were really happy with. Owen Roberts ran the ball well. (Roberge) ran the ball well. We were just a couple turnovers away,” said Ouellette.
With 50 seconds left in the third quarter, Deering would secure the lead for good. Soule scored his second touchdown of the night, when he rushed 63 yards into the end zone.
With 4:55 left in regulation, Dinizo would produce the final 27-16 score when he intercepted another pass and returned it 89 yards for the score.
“We played defense well, 14 of the points were from turnovers. We did hold them which was good because they’re an athletic team,” said Ouellette.
While the Mustangs will miss out on the Class A South playoffs, the future looks bright in Waterboro.
“We play in a really tough league and there’s a lot of really good teams but the future is bright. We will return 10 of our 11 starters on defense and we return our entire offensive line and we return our starting quarterback. It’s coming for sure,” said Ouellette.