Chase Hall stepped in front of Colt Snowden’s pitch near the line of scrimmage, read the play perfectly, and returned the backward toss 40 yards for a touchdown. That put Guilford up 21-0 with 3:37 left in the first half, and the Grizzlies never looked back, beating Amity 21-7 in their Southern Connecticut Conference opener at Kavanaugh Field on Thursday, Sept. 10.
The play was the exclamation point on a dominant second quarter, but the game was won earlier, in the trenches and on the edges, where Guilford’s defense smothered an Amity attack that managed just 95 first-half yards. Only 59 of those came after the Spartans’ opening drive. The Grizzlies forced three or four fumbles, according to Amity coach George French, and turned one of them into the score that broke the game open.
“We didn’t make the plays when we needed to,” French said. “We had three or four huge fumbles tonight. You are not going to win that way. We are young in certain areas right now. We lost all our starting skill guys from last year, so we are replacing. It’s their first game action.”
Guilford’s offense needed little time to find its rhythm after a scoreless first quarter. One possession after missing a field goal, the Grizzlies marched 60 yards in three plays, the big one a 56-yard completion from sophomore quarterback Ryan Lynch to Reed Hovick. Two plays later, junior Shane Connelly burst in from 14 yards out, and Owen Andrews added the extra point for a 7-0 lead with 3:28 gone in the second.
The defense forced a punt, and Guilford needed just four plays to cover 34 yards. Lynch hit Ben Mennone on a 29-yard scoring strike with 5:02 left in the half. Lynch finished the first half 5-of-8 for 123 yards and that touchdown.
“We practiced, we knew what they were going to do,” Connelly said. “We knew their concepts, and what they were planning to do on us. I think we handled it perfectly.”
Connelly ran for 86 yards and the touchdown, leading a ground game that kept Amity’s defense honest while Lynch worked the seams. The sophomore’s 123 passing yards in the opening half set up the quick-strike scores that put the game out of reach before the break.
“We go into the season knowing that defense is probably going to be one of our bigger strengths just because we have a lot of kids coming back in that spot,” Guilford coach Brian White said. “Playing Amity is always a very physical game. The last couple of years we played them, it’s always been hard hitting, it almost seems like you throw it back to 1985 type football game.”
Amity didn’t fold. The Spartans put together a 16-play, 99-yard drive that consumed 6:27 in the fourth quarter, capped by Snowden’s 10-yard touchdown pass to Tyler McDaniel with 4:40 remaining. That cut the lead to 14, and Amity got the ball back one more time. A turnover ended any comeback hopes.
John Courtney ran for 177 yards for Amity, a bright spot on a night where the Spartans couldn’t convert opportunities. The missed field goal early in the second quarter was one. The fumbles were several more. Against a Guilford defense that flew to the ball all night, those mistakes proved fatal.
“It was just team tackling. We all flew around. All eleven of us did our part. That was honestly the way we had to do it,” Connelly said.
Guilford moves to 1-0. Amity drops to 0-1. The Grizzlies’ defense, with so many returning starters, looked every bit the strength White predicted. The offense, with a sophomore at quarterback and a junior carrying the load, found enough big plays to make the difference.
According to Yahoo Sports.
