No. 8 Fairfield Prep gets physical, takes it to Notre Dame-West Haven

WEST HAVEN — Sometimes football can still come down to the simplest of things: line up and see if you can stop me.

Fairfield Prep took over possession Friday night up a touchdown in the fourth quarter. The Jesuits embarked on a long drive, mostly with running plays between the tackles. Notre Dame-West Haven couldn’t stop them.

Daniel Barnick capped the drive with a 12-yard touchdown to put Prep up two touchdowns. Eighthranked Prep had to hang on for the 28-22 win at Veterans Stadium, but Prep can look back to that 14-play scoring drive that helped seal the important SCC victory.

“It’s all about being a physical team. I knew my brothers would block for me,” Barnick said. “We did what we needed to do and got it done. It’s as simple as that. I like to believe our men were more physical tonight. We out-strategized them, we had a better scheme. They just couldn’t do anything about it. We ran it right down their throat.”

Prep (4-1) ran it 11 times and picked up four key first downs, including one on a 4th-and-2 play. The Jesuits took more than 7 minutes off the clock.

“A great performance up front helped us set the tone,” Fairfield Prep coach Keith Hellstern said. “That kept us in charge of the pace of the game, basically. Be physical, move the ball, eat some clock, take what we can get. The running game was working for us, so we rode the hot hand.”

Fairfield Prep quarterback Connor Smith completed all three passes on the drive — all of them to fellow senior Jack Reilling. The touchdown came with 1:58 left in the game and put Prep up 28-14.

“The 14-play drive my hats off to them,” Notre Dame-West Haven coach Joe DeCaprio said. “They are more of a spread team this year but when they had to, they got 3 (yards) at a clip and overcame some penalties.”

But Notre Dame (2-3) wasn’t finished. Notre Dame quarterback Matt Piechota completed all three of his passes on the ensuing possession to Austin Granata, the last two for 45 yards and the 11yard touchdown, respectively. Robert Torres caught the 2-point conversion pass to help the Green Knights pull within 28-22 with 1:07 left.

Then came the onsides kick. Notre Dame recovered it, but the officials determined it did not go the necessary 10 yards.

“They said it did not go 10, it stopped and was spinning at 9,” Hellstern said. “Every week is its own season. That’s the honest to God truth. Because if we don’t approach it that way you can put yourself in peril or stumble, and we don’t want to do that.”

Said DeCaprio: “We saw it on film and the nose of the ball hits the stripe. It comes back, it went 10 yards in my opinion. I’ve got to really see it, but we can’t blame it on the referee there. It would have been nice to have a shot, obviously. We made too many mistakes.”

The Green Knights only had one timeout left, so Prep was able to run out the clock.

Smith ran for one touchdown and passed for one — to Tim Pearson, an 11yard strike with 26.2 seconds left before halftime.

Piechota threw a 30yard touchdown to Torres and ran another one in himself.

“We shot ourselves in the foot multiple times tonight,” DeCaprio said. “We keep making sophomoric mistakes that are costing us football games. … We’ve got to stop making silly mistakes. We had two turnovers that cost us and gave them short fields.”