PLAISTOW, N.H. — Unbeaten Exeter High posed a monster challenge for winless Timberlane Regional on Thursday night.
A disastrous first quarter seriously challenged the Owls’ character. and coach Kevin Fitzgerald had to like his team’s response.
No, there was no miracle here under the Northern Lights as Exeter moved to 6-0 with the 28-0 shutout win. But the Owls, undersized as they were, showed plenty of grit against Exeter’s “grind-‘em-up” straight-T, battling to the very last snap.
“For years, we’ve been like that. It seems like the other guy has us size-wise, but our guys compete hard. They’re tough and physical and have pride in this program. I was proud of the way we competed,” said Fitzgerald, whose club falls to 0-6 and will see more of the Exeter-style T next Friday night at Spaulding. “We still made too many mistakes and didn’t help ourselves. Against a team like that, you’ve got to be clean. I liked the way we fought.”
Exeter broke to a 14-0 lead before the Owls could muster a first down on offense on a pair of Jack Cavanaugh TD runs.
“They’re good. They’ve been good for a while, and they’re good again. It got ugly early, but I thought our guys rallied a little bit. We got our feet underneath us. We played much better defensively as the game went on,” said Fitzgerald.
“Our defensive front was up against it physically. I thought our guys hung in. We made some plays. Liam Kelley at linebacker. William Foley has been pretty consistent all year up front, too.”
A late second-quarter fumble set up Exeter for its third score by Tyler Bland with under a minute to halftime. Dan Battstone closed out the scoring with a short TD run in the third.
Timberlane just couldn’t put together enough offensively to stay in it.
“They haven’t given up a whole lot of points to anybody (38 in six games), so we struggled a little bit offensively. I thought we competed hard for a full 48 minutes, and we made them work,” said Fitzgerald.
Exeter 28, Timberlane 0
Timberlane Statistics
Rushing: Jeremy Mlocek 9-(-31); Gio Recesso 5-16, Liam Kelley 3-1, Matt Fitzgerald 2-0, Tristan Benner 1-6
Passing: Mlocek 14-22, 131 yards
Receiving: Mikey Santosuosso 5-62, Recesso 3-26, Kelley 1-8, Fitzgerald 3-31, Spencer Brien 2-4