New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Hitting their stride
Hand rolls past Sheehan for second straight win
HAND 49 SHEEHAN 6
MADISON — Sheehan marched down the field with the opening possession Friday night using quick passes to the right side four straight times.
But after reaching the Hand 29-yard line, it was all Tigers as Hand rolled to a 49-6 Southern Connecticut Conference inter-tier contest at the Surf Club.
The Titans ran off 11 plays in all to start the game, but eventually a sack by John Hayden and an interception by Seth Sweitzer ended the Sheehan drive.
“They tried to stretch the field 53 yards wide, and they stacked the perimeter which is genius football,” Hand coach
Erik Becker said. “We’re not big enough in the box to reduce the box, so we were trying to play those screens inside out. We were able to get a turnover, stopped them on four downs and took over from there.”
Oh, did the Tigers take over. Senior quarterback Patch Flanagan (11-for-14 and 152 yards passing) connected with Sweitzer four plays later on quick post across the middle for a 51-yard touchdown with 5:30 to play in the opening quarter and Hand was on its way.
Ethan O’Brien (17 carries, 115 yards and three touchdowns) scooted in from 20 yards out with 36 seconds remaining in the quarter to make it 14-0.
Flanagan (five yards) and O’Brien (16 yards) added touchdowns in the second quarter as the Tigers took a 28-0 edge at
halftime.
“We’ve got a lot of guys playing both ways and on special teams,” Sheehan coach John Ferrazzi said. “We started to run out of gas and we got sloppy. We got too many penalties and started to unravel.”
O’Brien added his third touchdown of the night early in the third quarter, a 10-yard scamper in which he broke four tackles, to make it 35-0 as the game went to a running clock.
“The second I got outside, I got some great blocks from my receivers Seth Sweitzer and Shane Smith and was able to get into the end zone,” O’Brien said.
A 27-yard over-theshoulder catch by Sam Sisk in the end zone on a pass from Flanagan made it 42-0 going to the fourth quarter with the substitutes in for both sides.
“We had a great week of practice with the mentality of domination,” Flanagan said. “The line gave me so much time to make my reads and find my guys. They’re going to catch it and make plays.”
Jelan Kollie got Sheehan on the board with a four-yard run in the final quarter.
Backup quarterback Will Klein ran for a 34yard touchdown to close out the scoring for Hand.
Hand, which lost its first two games to Top 10 teams in Fairfield Prep and New Canaan, is now 2-2.
“It’s a big win that we owe it to our offensive line,” O’Brien said. “This was an important win for
us and we’re right back on the road to go to the playoffs.”
Becker smiled after the game when asked about how well the Tigers have played in their two victories against Masuk and Friday night.
“We certainly have gotten better every day,” Becker said. “Last I looked we have the hardest schedule in Connecticut. We played two Top 10 teams in Connecticut and came up just short.”
Sheehan dropped to
2-2.
“Hand has a ton of weapons and was probably the best 1-2 team that you’ll see,” Ferrazzi said. “We knew it was going to be a dogfight and it would be the best team we’ve played.”