Defense leads the way for undefeated St. Mary’s

LYNN — As they say in the world of combat sports, “Someone’s O has got to go.” In this one, however, it would’ve been a first-round knockout.

A pair of 3-0 Catholic Central League teams met at Manning Field Friday night, with host St. Mary’s cruising by Cathedral, 38-12.

St. Mary’s offense entered with an average of 33 points per game, but it was the defense that did a little bit of everything with four sacks, four tackles-for-losses, an interception from Michael Sherman, and a safety from Adrian Lule.

Better yet, Cathedral’s offense totaled 0 yards until the minute mark of the first quarter.

“Our defense played really well,” said St. Mary’s coach Sean Driscoll. “Our defensive line had been struggling a little bit early in the year, but they really stepped it up this week in practice and I sensed there were going to be good things.”

Another good thing was what happened on Cathedral’s second play from scrimmage. After a St. Mary’s blitz, Jake Peterson intercepted a short pass from Cathedral quarterback Xavier Roman and returned it 15 yards to the house.

“The pick-six really set the tone for us and it was a huge help,” Driscoll said. “They’ve got some talent and some speed over there, but I think we did a nice job at taking away some of their better players.”

As for the other side of the ball, the story of the game was Tyler Guy, who went home with three touchdowns. He recovered a fumble in the endzone during the second quarter, then caught a pair of second-half touchdown passes from quarterback Yaniel Belliard.

“He (Guy) played unbelievable,” Driscoll said. “He had a nice game tonight on both sides of the ball.”

Scoreboard aside, it wasn’t the cleanest game from the Spartans. They threw an interception, fumbled twice, and failed to recover a punt.

“With a 24-6 lead at the half, you’d think your coach would be pretty happy, but there were too many balls on the ground and too many penalties – all the stuff we talk about all the time, which is really frustrating,” Driscoll said. “We’ve got a lot of work to do after the fourth game of the year.”

But good teams bounce back from mistakes. Driscoll credited his players for doing so in the second half.

“I liked our resilience and how we recovered from those stupid mistakes,” he said.

Cathedral scored a 26-yard touchdown in the first half on fourth down, then another late in the game while the clock was running, but that would be all.

Other key plays from St. Mary’s included two bone-crushing hits from Maxwell Parent, a third-down sack from Jack Hurley, and a quarterback-keeper from Belliard that found the endzone during the first quarter.

The Spartans (No. 11 in Division 3 power rankings as of Friday morning) return to action Saturday, Oct. 12 in a home game against Bishop Stang. Kickoff is slated for 5:30 p.m.

“We’re still working hard, we’re very young, and we’ve got a lot of people getting reps… but it’s about finishing and keeping your composure when things are going good,” Driscoll said. “We’ve got a lot of coaching left to do.”

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