79ers

Nighthawks 0, Southern Dutchess Patriots 0: The final game of an outstanding season for the 79ers ended in an exciting tie. The 79ers had amazing sweeps by Tucker Garrity, Matthew Dubois, and Jordan Fultan, while Ryan Tani, Griffen Cross, and Luke Melillo pounded the middle. John Albanesi, Jack Hannan, Brandon Giglio, Riley McCafferty, and Gavin Connors were monsters on defense. Gren Paynter had a stip and recovery in the first half, and late in the game Ethan Parson’s sack forced the Patriots to punt. Kyle Cascone, Kyle Sullivan, Ryan Straiton, Garrett Norberg, Jack Mulligan, Charlie Asetta, and Vincent Pindell all made key plays in the game.

Grade 4

Candlewood Valley League semifinal playoff game:

Newtown 14, Southern Dutchess 6: Newtown avenged a 6-0 regular-season loss to Southern Dutchess to advance to the championship game. Newtown marched all the way down the field for a quick rushing touchdown by Josh Dunn. Ryan Kost kicked the extra point to put the Hawks up 8-0. On the ensuing kickoff Newtown ran an onside kick and recovered the ball but dit not capitalize. Solid defense by Justin Cohelo and a fumble recovery by Simon Preston helped keep Southern Dutchess out of the end zone. Newtown, however, lost the ball on a fumble inside its own 15 and gave up a touchdown to make the score 8-6 at halftime. QB  Ryan Kost went for 6-for-6 passing in the game. Nicholas Weiland had three catches all for first downs and had a receiving touchdown. Josh Dunn and Kyle Roche each caught passes for critical first downs allowing Newtown to control possession and the clock. The offensive line, led by Andrew Deluca, Doug Carriero, Alex Street, and Ethan Tousignant, blocked well and allowed the team to execute. Newtown will face Norwalk at 9 am on Sunday at Kennedy Stadium in Bridgeport for the Orange Bowl Championship.

Grade 5

CVL playoff game:

Nighthawks 18, Norwalk Dolphins 12: Newtown was victorious in an exciting game that went into overtime and ended in a Kansas City shootout against a big and physical Norwalk Dolphins team. Just a few minutes into the game, Mitchell Savoca intercepted a pass and ran it in for a touchdown. Despite outstanding defensive play by Justin Dunn, Bobby Haskins, Seth Willis, Scott Bauer, and Colin McCafferty, Norwalk scored two touchdowns in the second quarter. After Norwalk went ahead going into the fourth quarter, Savoca ran for another touchdown, tying the score, with the help of great blocking by Anthony Adamcheck, Adam Bell, Ryan Norton, and Mitchell Long. In overtime, a touchdown by Nevin Zink brought the score to 18-12, but Norwalk still had a last chance to win the game. With Norwalk in possession, Joe Accousti intercepted a pass to end the hopes of a Norwalk victory. Newtown will face Ridgefield Black in this weekend’s CVL Championship Game.

Grade 7

CVL semifinals:

Newtown 32, Bridgeport 21: The Nighthawks advanced to the Candlewood Valley Championship round by beating a tough, fast, and physical Bridgeport Chargers team. Colton Smith and Julian Dunn combined on 22 carries for 187 yards and two touchdowns with Sugar Shane Quimby, Rat Rubino, Tim Krapf, James Leuci, and Jaret DeVellis adding another 66 yards on 16 rushes. 

While the young Hawks dominated the clock on the ground, it was the passing game that took the Chargers by surprise.

Up by only two points, Smith rolled out left and hit a streaking Troy Frangione in stride for the play of the game and a 55-yard TD catch to put Newtown up by 10 with Dunn’s kick conversion. Even 10 points against this talented Bridgeport team wasn’t enough as Bridgeport took the ensuing kickoff and raced 70 yards to pull within three.

As Newtown received the ball, clock management became the goal with their power running game as they took up over seven minutes of the fourth quarter on an 80-yard drive ending with Smith taking a naked bootleg around the left end to seal the deal and put them up by 11 with the fourth PAT kick conversion of the game by Dunn. The play of this series was a beautifully executed tight end screen pass to Connor Roche who followed blocks by Kevin Conte and Griffin Davis for a first down on fourth and long.  None of this would be possible without the dominating blocking by Conte, Davis, Markus Elken, Eric Cascone and Jake Lambert up front.

The Hawks’ defense has been an incredible force all season long and once again, came up big when needed.  Led by Tim “One Man Wrecking Crew” Krapf and his three sacks and two tackles in the back field, Elken adding another sack, Forest Speed shutting down his side of the field at corner back and Smith and Dunn combining for nine tackles at the safety position, Bridgeport was only able to gain 99 total yards on offense. Cascone and Davis also added two tackles in the backfield while the interior line of Lambert, Peter Manfredonia and Conte shut down any hope of yardage.

The seventh grade Hawks hope to win their fourth consecutive CVL Championship this Saturday against the undefeated Norwalk Panthers at Brien McMahon Stadium in Norwalk at 5 pm.