ADAMS, Mass. -- In the first half on Friday at Renfrew Park, the Hoosac Valley football team ran roughshod over visiting Westfield.
In the third quarter, the Hurricanes changed things up and put the game away.
Vance Eugene threw a pair of third-quarter touchdown passes, and the Hurricanes played dominating defense to hand the Bombers a 26-0 win in an independent game.
David Critelli ran for 60 yards and a pair of touchdowns on offense and played the other half of the game in the Westfield backfield.
The knockout blows came in the third. First, it was a 65-yard pass play from Eugene to Matt Hall on third-and-6. Then, after Eugene got the ball back with an interception on Westfield’s ensuing possession, he threw a 23-yard score to Nicholas Waterman to make it a four-score game.
“Our free safety made a great play over the middle, and Vance went after it and got that ball,” Hoosac Valley coach Dayne Poirot said of the pick. “We want to get the ball back and want to go back and score.
“Vance does a great job getting the ball to those guys, and they run some great routes. Izaha [Stubbs] does a great job and Nick does a great job, and the backs out of the backfield do a great job. And he gets the ball to them. I think being able to add that to our offense is helpful and beneficial to us.”
An old-school Hoosac Valley ground attack accounted for the game’s first score. The Hurricanes went 59 yards on their second possession with Critelli covering the final 27 on a fourth-and-1 run over the left side to make it 6-0 in the final minute of the first quarter.
In the second quarter, the Hurricanes caught a break when Westfield failed to clear out of the way of a bouncing punt which ricocheted off the heel of a bomber and into the hands of John Krol, who got Hoosac the ball on the plus-18.
Three runs later, Critelli scored from the 2 to put the ‘Canes on top, 12-0.
Hoosac Valley nearly scored again before half-time, but a frantic 42-yard run by Eugene from midfield came up short at the 6 as time expired.
The second half turned on the big Hoosac Valley passing plays and some big stops on defense.
The hosts set the tone on Westfield’s opening possession of the half, stopping a 34-yard drive by denying a fourth-and-8 at the Hurricanes’ 31.
Then, after Hall’s catch and run on a swing pass to the left put Hoosac Valley up 20-0 (with Critelli running in the two-pointer), Eugene’s INT accounted for the game’s only turnover.
His second TD throw of the night one play later made it 26-0, but Hoosac Valley was not ready to rest on its laurels.
Westfield rallied with its best drive of the night, going from its own 10 to first-and-goal at the five on a march that spanned the third and fourth quarters and consumed more than five minutes.
But the Hurricanes stuffed four straight running plays to secure their first shutout of the season.
“Shutouts have been rare for us the last few years, and I think that’s a really good job,” Poirot said. “I think defensively, we did a very good job. Part of that’s a tribute to the offense keeping the chains moving, but defensively we were able to kind of slow down a lot of the things they wanted to do.
“I thought our defensive line did a good job. I thought we covered pretty well. The whole defense kind of stepped up. Everyone did what they’re supposed to do. You saw a couple of times when things got loose and Vance came in and made a few big tackles that were important. I thought Nick Waterman did a good job controlling the defense, too. And up front, obviously, on the line of scrimmage, I think they did pretty well.”
Hoosac Valley (3-0) hosts South Hadley on Saturday in its final home game of the regular season.
