CVU defense stymies BFA-St. Albans, pitches second-half shutout
ST. ALBANS - There's new faces and new numbers in Hinesburg. There's also the same blurred flashes of red and white.
The seniors that delivered Champlain Valley its first football title graduated, but the Redhawks reloaded and used their hallmark athleticism to contain BFA-St. Albans.
Dylan Terricciano and Orion Yates held the edge at linebacker, Lucas Almena-Lee demanded attention in the middle and Dylan Frere and Co. kept the outside locked as the Redhawks shut out the Bobwhites in the second half for a 29-7 win on Saturday night.
“We discovered tonight that we do in fact have depth,” CVU coach Rahn Fleming said. “There's a difference between having numbers and having depth. And what we found out tonight is we have depth where we needed it to be. And we had kids who rallied around each other.”
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Leading 14-0 in the second quarter, Chase Leonard halted a promising BFA drive when the junior toe-tapped the sideline for an interception on the CVU 10. One play later, Frere caught a pass on the left sideline, shook one defender and broke another tackle for a 90-yard touchdown to put CVU ahead 20-0 with 3:07 left in the first half.
“We were running blitzes and stunts all night,” Fleming said. “Almost every defensive signal, almost every defensive call, so that we could keep their offensive line off balance.”
Terricciano, a sophomore, sacked Bobwhites’ quarterback Seneca Durocher forcing a BFA punt on their own 20-yard line with 10:19 left in the third quarter. On the ensuing play, the long snap went over Durocher’s head, and he was forced to take a safety giving the Redhawks a 22-7 lead.
On the next Bobwhite possession, Almena-Lee, who just began playing football this summer, split the gap on third down to force a 5-yard loss. The Bobwhites, on the CVU 30 and facing fourth-and-15, turned the ball over on downs after gaining 14 yards.
The Bobwhites had three drives stall inside the CVU 30-yard line.
“(Almena-Lee) never played a lick of football before he started when we started double-sessions. Look at that guy fly around and make plays,” Fleming said of the junior. “I mean, there's an awful lot to be happy about and there's an awful lot to work on.”
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Jacob Bose scored just three plays into the contest on a 1-yard TD rush and Nolan Walpole (10 carries for 51 yards) followed with a 12-yard tally midway through the second quarter. Walpole saw extended time after two CVU backs, including Bose, left the game with injuries. The junior capped the scoring on a 4-yard run with 8:01 left in the fourth quarter.
“We knew (Walpole) had something, we didn't know what it was yet,” Fleming said. “Tonight, we got to find that out.”
CVU quarterback Oliver Cheer was 6 for 13 for 157 yards and a touchdown pass.
Durocher (9 carries for 73 yards; 11 for 24 for 164 yards) had BFA’s lone touchdown on a 1-yard keeper with 10 seconds left in the first half.
“We knew that we had to contain outside, which brings me back to (Yates) on one side and (Terricciano) on the other side. Those guys had a lot of contain and control assigned to them tonight,” Fleming said.
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Contact Jacob Rousseau at JRousseau@gannett.com. Follow on Twitter: @ByJacobRousseau.
This article originally appeared on Burlington Free Press: Vermont high school football: CVU stymies BFA-St. Albans
