BEVERLY — Most of the pass routes Jayce Jean-Pierre ran Saturday against Beverly at Hurd Stadium were to the boundary. Those resulted in just one catch for one yard.
So his Peabody High football coaches decided to switch things up and have him run a corner post — and the senior captain turned the opportunity into the biggest play of the contest.
Facing 3rd-and-9 from from the Panthers’ 44-yard line, Jean-Pierre grabbed a pass from quarterback Luke Maglione at the 25-yard line, spun out of a would-be tackle and sprinted into the end zone with just 32 seconds remaining, giving the Tanners a dramatic 14-7 triumph.
Jean-Pierre set the wheels in motion for his own go-ahead score, picking off a Panther pass at his own 44-yard line with just 2:31 remaining. Four plays later, the Tanners had the lead for the first time all afternoon.
“That’s what a senior captain is supposed to do, and Jayce embraces that,” said Peabody head coach Mark Bettencourt after his team escaped an upset bid by the host and subsequently ended a three-game losing streak.
Peabody (now 4-4 overall) trailed a one-win Beverly squad at halftime (7-0), and it could have been worse had the the hosts not come up empty on eight tries from inside the 10-yard line in the the opening two quarters. But the Tanners held defensively, stepped it up even moreso beginning in the third quarter, and finally saw their offense get untracked.
After mustering just 42 yards of offense and three first downs in the opening two quarters, Peabody went on a 12-play drive that ate 7 minutes and 37 seconds off the clock to tie the game, 7-7, in the waning seconds of the third quarter. Using the run game to set up the pass, Maglione used a shovel pass to junior tight end Corey Dooley to score from six yards out on 3rd-and-down. Kicker Jake Marcotullio’s point-after boot put things all even.
“Last week we were down 21-0 (to Danvers) in the first quarter,” said Bettencourt, “so here I told them at halftime, ‘We’re only down 7-0; this is easy. Just make the corrections we have to make, tighten up on D, throw a zero up on the board and let your offense find a way to win. And that’s what we did.”
After Jayce-Dooley’s go-ahead score, Beverly (1-7) did have one final chance … which they almost cashed in on.
Burned by a last-minute kickoff return in a shocking last-second loss the prior week, Peabody instead tried an onsides kick against Beverly … and it didn’t travel to required 10 yards, giving the Panthers possession at the visitors’ 45-yard line. Quarterback Danny Pierce (11-for-22, 124 yards) found Liam Timpone and Callan McCay on quick hitters of 10 and 16 yards, and on the game’s final play he threw one towards the left corner of the end zone that was tipped, but ultimately fell to the grass incomplete.
“We’re not subbing a lot of guys; the tread isn’t too thick on our tires. They just wore us down,” said Beverly head coach Jeff Hutton. “But that’s why we’re so proud of our guys. We know we’re outmanned, we know we’re outgunned, but man, they played hard until there were no seconds left on the clock and they had a chance to tie or win it.”
Beverly, which got interceptions from juniors Sean Costa and Xavier Aux, was hoping to earn its first victory since opening day. They had four cracks inside the Peabody 7-yard line in the first quarter but could only get three yards; they then had 1st-and-goal at the 3 in the second stanza and wound up at the 1 with two chances to punch it in, but couldn’t either time out of a Wildcat look.
“That’s our strength in the D-line,” said Bettencourt, referring to captains Jimmy Festa and Dylan Annese, massive run stuffer Matt Mastrocola, Jayden Betts and Dooley. “When they run inside, we feel like we have a better chance. We were waiting for some play action or QB play action that didn’t come. We were able to stuff it up the middle; it’s what we were hoping they’d do.”
While the loss admittedly stung, Hutton, who said Timpone (7 catches, 69 yards) had “the best game of his career”, feels his squad can use their performance Saturday as motivation heading into their two non-playoff games, followed by Thanksgiving Day at Salem, to fuel them the rest of the way.
“We lost two games by 1 point (to Danvers) and seven points (Peabody) against teams going to the playoffs and we within one (8-7) at halftime against a very good Masconomet team going to the postseason,” said Hutton. “Our guys are still fighting, and I feel like there’s still some wins out there for us.”
Bettencourt, whose team will once again be in the Division 2 playoffs, stressed to his players all week that the Tanners hadn’t had a four-game losing streak since his first season on the job in 2013.
“I told them, ‘This is not that (2013) team. Don’t let that happen to you’,” he recalled. “We didn’t want that reputation or stigma to come on this team. Yes, we have a lot of injuries, but let’s go out, make some plays and get that win.”
Peabody 14, Beverly 7
at Hurd Stadium, Beverly
Peabody (4-4);0;0;7;7;14
Beverly (1-7);0;7;0;0;7
Scoring summary
B — Liam Timpone 9 pass from Danny Pierce (Maverick Genest kick)
P — Corey Dooley 6 pass from Luke Maglione (Jake Marcotullio kick)
P — Jayce Jean-Pierre 44 pass from Maglione (Marcotullio kick)
Individual Statistics
RUSHING: Peabody — Caio Santos 17-54, Gabe Santos 15-51, Jayce Jean-Pierre 1-14, Luke Maglione 3-11; Beverly — Greg White 7-29, Floyd White 4-5, Jayden Santos 6-4, Sean Costa 3-0, Danny Pierce 4-(-11).
PASSING: Peabody — Maglione 10-19-99-2-2; Beverly — Pierce 11-22-124-1-1, Ray Kwiatek 1-1-31-0-0, Costa 0-1-0-0-0.
RECEIVING: Peabody — Jean-Pierre 2-45, Corey Dooley 5-32, Joquim Chaves 1-22, Tyler Rappold 2-0; Beverly — Liam Timpone 7-79, F. White 2-47, Jack Consedine 1-13, Callan McCay 1-11, Santos 1-5.