The fall sports season keeps steaming along with city squads emerging victorious more often than not.
It may seem hard to believe, but some squads are already nearing the midway point of the regular season and the action is just heating up.
Here’s a look back at the week that was and a glimpse at what’s to come.
Football
Deering’s football team continues to steal headlines, improving to 3-0 on the season with a decisive 35-6 home win over reigning Class C champion Leavitt last Friday night. Joey Foley’s 12-yard touchdown run put the Rams in front to stay, 7-0, after one quarter. Tavian Lauture hit Zeke Dewever on an 18-yard TD strike for a 14-0 halftime advantage. After the Hornets got on the board, a 22-yard Lauture-to-Corbin Burke touchdown pass made it 21-6 heading to the fourth period. There, Lauture put it away with touchdown scampers of 38- and 80-yards.
“We were just trying to punch it down their throats, set a tone in the first half,” said Foley, who carried 24 times for 103 yards.
“I thought we had a chance to be maybe a little more physical and that was sort of the mindset in the first half,” said Deering coach Brendan Scully.
The Rams have a big test Friday at Massabesic (3-0). A year ago, Deering lost a close game at the Mustangs, 17-14.
“This is a big win but we’re on to next week now,” Lauture said. “This week is in the past.”
Portland hoped to join Deering at 3-0, but the Bulldogs met their match at Bonny Eagle last Friday. The Scots drove the field for a quick touchdown and after a Bulldogs’ three-and-out, Bonny Eagle struck again to make it 14-0. After Portland was stopped on fourth-and-short inside its own territory, the Scots were on the brink of breaking the game open, but Louis Thurston intercepted a pass to give the Bullodgs life. Portland then marched for a touchdown, a 7-yard pass from Thurston to Cordell Jones, and Jones added the two-point conversion rush to cut the deficit to six points. In the fourth quarter, the Bulldogs drove into Bonny Eagle territory three different times, but Jones fumbled the ball away at the 7, then Portland twice turned the ball over on downs and the Scots held on to prevail, 14-8, dropping the Bulldogs to 2-1 on the season.
“We just didn’t do enough,” lamented Portland coach Sean Green. “We tell the guys it’s about us and tonight, we didn’t do what we needed to do. Hopefully we’ll learn from it. We’re a team that thinks we can score whenever we want. We have playmakers who have to make those plays and as coaches, we need to put them in better situations as well.”
This Friday night (kickoff has been moved up to 6 p.m.), the Bulldogs will welcome Lewiston (2-0) in a key Class A North showdown. Last year, Portland beat the Blue Devils twice, 47-8 in the regular season and 32-8 in the quarterfinal round of the playoffs.
“Lewiston’s a really good team,” said Green. “They’re senior-laden and deep. They’ll have a lot of guys who can play one way. We’ll have to roll with what we have and we’ll have to make plays.”
Cheverus got in the win column for the first time last Friday night, beating host Westbrook, 18-14, to improve to 1-2. The Stags shot to an 18-0 lead, then held on for dear life to give Skip Capone his first victory with the program.
Cheverus looks to even its record when it welcomes 1-2 Biddeford Saturday afternoon. The teams didn’t meet a year ago.
Field hockey
Cheverus’ field hockey team extended its regular season win streak to 51 games last week by sandwiching home victories over Gorham (4-1) and Sanford (3-0) around a 7-0 blanking of host Falmouth. Against the Rams, Lucy Johnson had a hat trick, while Zoey Radford also scored a goal. In the win over the Navigators, Johnson scored three more goals, giving her nine for the season and a state record 127 for her career, while Radford, Gabrielle Blais, Sydney Brunelle and Caroline Rousseau all finished once. The Stags were held scoreless in the first half for the first time all season by the Spartans, but Radford scored early in the second half, then Johnson set up goals by Brunelle and Rousseau to clinch it. Goalie Ellie Skolnekovich, who also sang the national anthem, made six critical saves.
“It’s really important to have these close games,” Radford said. “It keeps us humble and working hard.”
“I think it’s great to get a game like this, super-fun,” said Skolnekovich. “We love playing tight games. It was a great opportunity for us. We showed a lot of compete and we were really strong on the field.”
“It was anyone’s game today,” added Cheverus first-year coach Andrea Musante. “It’s good to be challenged. It’s important. We learn more from being challenged like we were today.”
The Stags, who had outscored the opposition this fall, 24-1, were at Marshwood Tuesday and visit Thornton Academy Thursday. Cheverus has a home showdown looming against Biddeford, the team that appears to be their top challenger, next Wednesday.
“We’re coming along great,” Radford said. “I don’t think we’ve ever had a stronger bond. It’s like we’re sisters out there. We just have to keep up the positivity and keep working hard and growing our game.”
“We embrace the bulls-eye,” said Skolnekovich. “We play as a team and we know we’re strong together. We just need to keep working hard and keep moving forward.”
“The whole league is strong and we have a big target on our back,” Musante added. “We won’t get to exhale this season. We just have to stay healthy and well-rested. There’s a lot of miles on our legs. One of my focuses as a coach is preserving them.”
Portland/Deering fell to 0-5 after 7-0 losses last week to visiting Massabesic and at Windham. Goalie Emma Walsh made 32 saves against the Mustangs and had 13 saves in the loss to the Eagles. Portland/Deering was at Kennebunk Monday and welcomes Biddeford Monday of next week.
Waynflete evened its record at 2-2 with a 2-0 win at Sacopee Valley last week. The Flyers welcomed Sacopee Valley Monday, play host to Wells Wednesday and are home versus Traip Academy Friday.
Boys’ soccer
Waynflete’s boys’ soccer team suffered shutout losses to Class B South contenders Greely (5-0) and York (6-0) last week, then got in the win column and improved to 1-3 with a 1-0 victory at rival North Yarmouth Academy Saturday afternoon. Lucas Plumb converted a penalty kick for the game’s lone goal.
“It’s a breath of fresh air,” said Plumb. “This will help the team a lot. It will boost team morale. The last few games were kind of iffy, but this one, we showed we could play much better. Big props to the defense. The center-backs did a great job.”
“It feels really great to get an in-conference win,” said back and senior captain Duncan Isherwood. “It was tough to protect the lead for 40 minutes against a really good team. They came at us hard.”
“This was a much-needed win,” added Waynflete coach Will Burdick. “We talked about being desperate for a win. We’ve always had a great rivalry with NYA. Ever since I was a kid, it’s always been a battle. To beat a team that hadn’t lost yet and battled us all day, it feels good and I’m really proud of the guys.”
The Flyers visit Gray-New Gloucester Thursday, travel to Sacopee Valley Saturday and visit St. Dom’s Tuesday of next week.
“We have to just keep this momentum going,” said Isherwood. “We have to keep up the grit, toughness and intensity into our next games. We have some good opponents coming up.”
“Our goal is to make it to the state final and win it,” Plumb said.
“This is a good time for us to flip our switch,” Burdick added. “We feel confident in ourselves and hopefully this will put us in the right direction. We have a much-needed break, then we have five games in seven days. We have a tough stretch coming up and it’s not easy winning games in this conference, but we’re looking forward to it.”
Portland won its first five contests, capped by a 7-1 home win over Bonny Eagle and an 8-0 victory at Massabesic. Against the Scots, Isaac Rodrigues-Nkanza had three goals, while Paolo Joao, Alianca Luzolotemo, Eliezier Mambueni and Osvaldo Silva added one apiece. Baptista Muanda finished with four assists. In the win over the Mustangs, David Mawangu had three goals and Rodrigues-Nkanza, Silva, Colin Degenhardt, Silvio Mbayi and Isaac Pedro all scored once. Friday, the Bulldogs fell to 5-1 with a 2-1 loss at Gorham. Mawangu scored Portland’s lone goal. The Bulldogs are idle until Saturday when they have a showdown at Scarborough.
Deering, the reigning Class A South champion, was 2-3-1 following home losses to Falmouth (2-1) and Windham (2-0) and a 3-2 victory at Westbrook. Augusto Daniel scored the lone goal against the Navigators. In the win, Guilerme Francisco Jose scored the decisive goal with less than five minutes to play. Daniel and Peter Sargent also scored for the Rams. Deering hosts Biddeford Wednesday and travels to Thornton Academy Friday.
Cheverus, which lost its first three games, sandwiched victories over visiting Sanford (5-1) and host Noble (4-0) around a 5-1 home loss to Gorham last week. Against the Spartans, Henry Huntley scored three goals and Cris Bitagiliayi and Ange-Michel Liwanga added a goal apiece. Huntley had the lone goal in the setback. Liwanga scored three times and Huntley had the other goal in the win over the Knights. The Stags are back in action Friday at Westbrook.
Girls’ soccer
On the girls’ side, Cheverus improved to 4-0-1 after decisive wins last week over visiting Portland (9-0) and host Westbrook (7-1). Against the Bulldogs, the Stags needed fewer than seven minutes to go in front to stay, as Finley Brown scored on a header. Annie Vigue then scored twice and after assisting on the first three tallies, Sophia Monfa got in on the fun, scoring two straight goals to make it 5-0. Alaina Holmes and Taylor Hoglund struck before the first half was over and Cheverus had a stunning 7-0 advantage at the break. Seven minutes into the second half, Jillian Foley buried a penalty kick and eight minutes later, Addison Rush scored as well, so by rule, when the clock hit 20 minutes with the margin eight goals or greater, the contest was stopped and the Stags had a 9-0 victory.
“We played a different formation this time and tried to capitalize on our strengths,” said Monfa. “We’re a senior-heavy group that has played club soccer. Experience is one of our strengths. We see an opportunity and we pass and we’re not selfish. That’s why we were able to score. That’s something we’ve been working on, moving the ball.”
“It’s really satisfying,” said Stags coach Craig Roberts. “We did things the right way. We created space with runs, players filled the space, we found them in space. We played simply in the attacking third and finished our chances. In our first three games, we had tons of opportunities but we didn’t have the finishing efficiency. Today we had that.”
In Cheverus’ win over the Blue Blazes, Holmes scored three goals, Monfa added a pair and Brown and Vigue finished with one apiece. Vigue also had an assist, the 28th of her career, which ties the program record held by Emma Gallant.
Cheverus hosted Deering Tuesday, welcomes powerhouse Gorham Thursday (see our website for game story), goes to Kennebunk Saturday, then hosts two-time reigning Class A champion Scarborough next Tuesday.
“The seniors know this is it,” Monfa said. “We have to have the confidence we can beat teams like Scarborough, Gorham and Windham. We’ve gotten really close.”
“I think we’re on schedule,” said Roberts. “I don’t want to jinx it, but we’re playing the way we have to play to compete against top-tier teams. We have Gorham next week. That’s our second top tier game. We just have to play the game that’s in front of us and the girls are doing a really good of that.”
Portland fell to 0-5 after falling at Cheverus (9-0) and at home to Thornton Academy (4-0) last week. Bulldogs senior goalkeeper Jane Flynn stopped five shots against the Stags, but that was only the beginning of her story.
Flynn was added to the team’s roster the day before the game after starting keeper Linda Nicholson went out with injury. Flynn, a standout ice hockey player, offered to fill the void and stepped in in admirable fashion.
“Cheverus is a really good team,” said Portland coach Matt Bernstein. “They’re well-coached, they have great players and they clearly have good chemistry going. They’ll be difficult to beat. It’s quality individual players and a team game. Not only their technical ability, but knowing where to be, the runs they make. It makes it challenging.
“Throughout the game, we learned how to react and made adjustments. That was encouraging for me to see. That’s all you can do against a really good team. I’m proud of my girls. They fought as hard as they could.”
The Bulldogs went to Scarborough Tuesday, host Bonny Eagle Thursday and Marshwood Saturday, then travel to Westbrook Tuesday of next week.
“We’ll keep working on things and learning,” said Bernstein. “Obviously, it would be nice to get our first win, but even when we win our first one, that’s not the end of us learning and growing. I think we’re a lot closer than maybe the score today showed and I think we’ll get there soon. I’m excited about it.”
Deering fell to 0-4-1 after a 5-0 home loss to Scarborough and a 1-0 setback at Sanford last week. Goalie Annabelle Price made a dozen saves in the loss to the Red Storm and had five saves against the Spartans. The Rams visited Cheverus Tuesday, welcome Kennebunk Thursday, play at Biddeford Saturday, then host South Portland Tuesday of next week.
Reigning Class C state champion Waynflete fell to 1-2-1 after a 7-0 setback at Greely and a 3-0 home loss to NYA last week. Against the Panthers, in a rematch of last year’s Class C South Final, the Flyers got five saves from goalkeeper Rachel Yordon and had a 5-4 edge in corner kicks, but couldn’t get the ball in the net.
“It was a lot of fun watching the girls play and do the things we’ve been working on and building off,” said Waynflete’s first-year coach Jesse McDonough. “The finishing piece wasn’t there and a couple bounces just didn’t go our way.”
The Flyers play host to two-time reigning Class B champion Yarmouth Thursday, then welcome York Saturday and St. Dom’s Tuesday of next week.
“It’s been fun getting to know the girls,” said McDonough. “They already had a great foundation. It’s been easy to build off that. We have to keep their spirits up that we’re a new team and we won’t be where we were at the end of last season right away. I think we need to get a little more organized defensively, figure out our roles in the midfield and I think we’re close in terms of being able to score, but we have to figure out how to get some more firepower.”
Volleyball
Cheverus’ volleyball team fell to 1-4 after straight-set losses last week at five-time reigning Class B champion Yarmouth (21-25, 23-25, 17-25) and at home to Gorham. After hosting Greely Tuesday, the Stags visit Scarborough Thursday and travel to Portland Tuesday of next week.
Deering fell to 1-4 after a straight-set home loss to Kennebunk and a marathon five-set setback at Scarborough last week. The Rams looked to get back on track Tuesday at home versus Thornton Academy. Deering is home versus Brunswick Saturday.
Portland fell to 0-5 following a four-set (20-25, 25-19, 17-25, 19-25) home loss to Westbrook and a straight-set setback at Sanford. The Bulldogs went to reigning Class A champion Gorham Monday, visit Lewiston Thursday and Windham Saturday, then return home Tuesday of next week to face Cheverus.
Cross country
Portland’s reigning Class A champion boys’ cross country team hosted Falmouth, Noble and Thornton Academy last week. The Bulldogs finished first and were led by individual champion Aran Johnson, who had a time of 16 minutes, 19 seconds. In the girls’ meet, Portland came in first. Maia Endicott paced the Bulldogs with a third-place showing (20:45).
Deering hosted Gorham, Kennebunk and Sanford. Deering’s boys were first and featured top individual Ellis Wood (16:59). The girls’ meet was won by Kennebunk with Deering coming in second (Charlotte Pelletier was second individually in 21:43).
Golf
On the links, Cheverus was 3-3 after a 9-4 loss to Falmouth and a 9.5-3.5 win over Portland last week. Matthew Paradis had a team-best nine-hole score of 38 against the Navigators. Liam Cloutier led the way in the victory with a score of 37.
Portland fell to 2-4 last week with losses to Scarborough (11.5-1.5) and Cheverus (9.5-3.5). Lucas Milliken shot a 37 versus the Red Storm. Adam Paradise had a team-best 39 against the Stags.
Deering fell to 0-5 after losing, 9.5-3.5, to South Portland last week.
Portland Press Herald staff writer Steve Craig contributed to this story.
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