McCann Tech Football Finishes Perfect Regular Season
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. -- On Sunday morning, they are going to flip a coin to decide whether McCann Tech is the No. 1 seed or the No. 2 seed in the upcoming Western Massachusetts Division 6 playoffs.
Do not expect Hornets coach Bob LeClair to lose much sleep wondering if it comes up heads or tails.
Don’t be surprised if LeClair loses some sleep worrying about whichever team McCann ends up playing in next Saturday’s sectional semifinal.
“Those were our two toughest ballgames of the year, certainly, Mohawk and Franklin Tech,” LeClair said, referring to the third- and fourth-seeded teams in the four-team draw. “20-14 and 20-16, the two games. They were nail-biters the whole way.
“We know either one of them is going to be a load. They know us. We know them. There are great rivalries between the two teams and the two schools. It’s going to be a slugfest.
“There will be some pounding and hitting and all that down here next week.”
McCann gets to play “down here” in the Hornets Nest thanks to the 8-0 regular season it finished Saturday with a 55-8 win over Dean Tech of Holyoke.
It is the first perfect season in the 51-year history of McCann Tech football, and, other than the wins over playoff-bound Mohawk and Franklin Tech, the year featured some of the most lopsided scores you’d want to see.
Take out those two games, and McCann has outscored its other six opponents 55-5.
Saturday’s game was pretty typical.
The Hornets scored three touchdowns before they took their fifth offensive snap, started resting their starters midway through the second quarter and had a 49-0 lead at half-time.
Brett Pecor opened the scoring with a 52-yard toucdown on the second play of the game. After Dakota Bolte picked off a pass at the Dean Tech 25, Eathan Heller ran the ball in to make it 12-0; Levi Lawson’s first extra point of the game put the Hornets up by 13 with fewer than two minutes off the clock.
A 6-yard loss and a fumble in the backfield backed up Dean to its 9 before it punted on its next possession, and Lawson took that punt back 31 yards for McCann’s third TD. Rahmer Vincent threw to Adam Dufur for the conversion, and the Hornets led 21-0.
McCann went on to score each time it touched the ball in the first half, getting a 45-yard run from Heller and a pair of scores from Matt Dellaghelfa, who came in as part of the team’s second unit on offense and ran for an 11-yard score before running back an interception 17 yards to make it 49-0 at half-time.
The second half started with a fourth-down stop from one of the commonwealth’s top defenses followed by a 42-yard drive that ended in a 17-yard run by Michael Ferrara.
Ferrara, a freshman, took over at quarterback for second-string signal-caller Bolte, who spelled Nick Lincoln.