RallyNorth.net

North Shore Tech football finishes winless

Wednesday, November, 21 By Nick Turczak
Staff writer

WAKEFIELD | Northeast Metro football coach Don Heres told North Shore Tech coach Mike Drouin and some of his players to "hang in there" after last night's season finale. "I told them they're going to be really good in a couple of years," said Heres.

That was small consolation to North Shore Tech, who made it interesting for a half but saw Northeast run away with a 34-12 win. The Bulldogs finished 0-11 in Drouin's first year as head coach.

"I liked our team's progress," said Drouin.

But it wasn't enough to stop Northeast's ground game, which featured Chris MacDonald and Korey Keane.

MacDonald had the backbreaking touchdown on a 73-yard run that made it 20-6 on the first play of the second half. Meanwhile, Keane, who was called up from the JV team late in the season because of injuries, finished with three touchdowns and 106 yards on just five attempts.

"We knew what they were going to run. We just couldn't stop it," said Drouin.

"But we really shot ourselves in the foot in the first half. We made way too many mistakes, which swayed the game one way or another.We couldn't finish our opportunities."

North Shore Tech couldn't get anything going on the ground, so it had to rely on the passing of David St. Pierre, who ended up having a terrific game, hitting on 12 of 19 attempts for 160 yards and a touchdown.

Northeast Metro didn't have an impressive record at 3-8, but it played well down the stretch, winning its final two games. And it badly wanted a win over the Bulldogs, who've been a nemesis.

"We had some older kids who played up to the level of the game," said Heres. "It's the first time we've beaten these guys in five years."

Despite some sloppy play that included penalties and mishandling the ball on the snap, North Shore Tech kept it close in the first half.

After Korey Keane scored on a 76-yard run and added the two-point conversion for Northeast, the Bulldogs narrowed it to 8-6 when David St. Pierre threw a 20-yard scoring pass to Jacob Hills with eight seconds left in the opening period.

But disaster struck for North Shore Tech in the final minute of the half. Forced to punt deep in its own territory, Tech's Jamie Navas had to leap for the bad snap and was tackled at the 5-yard line before he could kick the ball.

Northeast wasn't about to squander such a great opportunity. Keane ran it in from the three with only 33 seconds left in the half, making it 14-6 at intermission. "That play was huge," said Drouin. "It gave them a lot of momentum going in at halftime."