Danvers spoils Tewksbury home opener in new digs
TEWKSBURY — Doucette Field 2.0 could not have a more spectacular debut on a special, solemn day, easily living up to the hype.
Danvers High School simply ended the party way too soon for the packed home crowd.
The Falcons led from start to finish in this Division 4 non-conference matchup, thumping the host Redmen, 35-18.
“It’s great that we stepped up to the challenge,” said Danvers High coach Ryan Nolan.
Sparked by a pair of sophomores, who got their feet wet last spring during the “Fall 2” season, Danvers owned nearly all the big plays. They did a huge chunk of damage through the air.
“Great quarterback, put the ball where we needed it, just perfect throws,” said receiver Owen Gasinowski, who caught four balls for a game-high 166 yards and a TD. “Our receivers did a great job running the routes, blocking was amazing, just everything was perfect. We had a lot of big pass plays, which was nice.”
His sophomore classmate
Travis Voisine was the trigger man, with four starts under his belt last year, the kid had the look of a seasoned vet.
Voisine was 9 of 12, torching the Redmen secondary for 268 yards.
“He put it on the money, and the kids did the right things,” said Nolan. “They were really on the money, just great plays all around. That was really good to see.”
For a while, it looked like this would be an old-school Doucette slugfest. Tewksbury is Tewksbury, and the Redmen played with their usual grit.
But, with the score at 7-6 Danvers and just seconds to halftime, Voisine set the tone for the remaining 24 minutes when he found senior Max Gasinowski in stride, running open to the post. The 49-yard TD hookup with just 15 seconds to the break was a back-breaker for the youthful Redmen.
Colin Kelter expanded the margin to 21-6, taking the opening kick of the third quarter 78 yards for the score.
The hosts rallied with two straight TDs – the first set up by a 65-yard Dan Fleming kick-return answer and the second on a ball-jarring stick by Michael Sullivan that teammate Sean Hirtle covered near the sideline at the Falcon 42.
Alex Arbogast sped in for his second TD of the day, and Fleming added a 1-yard plunge to slice things to 2118.
Danvers found another explosive answer, though.
Voisine and Owen Gasinowski clicked for 53 big ones into the red zone, then Kelter bumped the margin to 28-18 to close out the third on an 11-yard bustout.
From there, the sophomore Voisine looked extremely adept at clockmilking and keep-away, keeping the Tewskbury offense on the sideline for much of the fourth and ending the day with a late 2-yard keeper to ice it.
For Danvers, there was excitement.
“We’re a young team. We just have to show up (to work) every day,” said Owen Gasinowski.
For Tewksbury, there is the need to rally around some quality individual work on offense from the likes of Arbogast (13 carries, 81 yards), Fleming and Sullivan, then eliminate the mistakes.
“We have some inexperienced guys, and now they have a game under their belts,” said Tewksbury coach Brian Aylward. “Now, they know what to expect. And now we have to just keep on building on that and keep working.”