BYFIELD — Manchester Essex visited Triton on Friday night looking for its first win of the season, but it just wasn’t going to happen.
Not with the Vikings celebrating their Senior Night.
Inspired by its upperclassmen and the opportunity to get back to a .500 record on the season, Triton came away with a massive 48-8 victory over Manchester Essex in a game that was dominated from the opening kick.
The Vikings (3-3) got on the board early in the first quarter with a pair of rushing touchdowns from lead back Royce Whitney and starting QB Sam Harding, as the duo combined for nearly 200 yards on the ground for the entire night.
“We played a lot cleaner today and that’s what we needed to do,” said Triton head coach Ed Melanson. “We shot ourselves in the foot repeatedly (last week against North Reading), so it was nice to come out and play a lot cleaner of a game tonight.”
The Triton run game gave Manchester Essex problems all night long.
The Hornets (0-5) tried to pull some tricks before the half with a fake punt, but couldn’t convert before turning it over on downs. Harding then added another first half touchdown from 17 yards out to give the Vikings a 21-0 lead in the second quarter.
So in desperate need of some offense, Conrad Garfield came up big for Manchester Essex with a 50-yard run, and followed it up with a 5-yard touchdown run to stop the bleeding. At the time it almost looked promising for the Hornets, but Triton just wouldn’t stop.
Jerimiah Price caught a 25-yard touchdown pass from Harding to extend the lead, and a 55-yard punt return score from Robert Merrill Jr. broke everything open by making it a 35-8 game at halftime. Despite the game not going in the Hornets’ favor, Melanson still had high praise for first-year head coach Nick Broughton and his team.
“They’re a young team and their future’s bright,” said Melanson. “They’ve got a lot of freshmen, a lot of underclassmen, and then I know they’re going to be okay down the road.”
Noah Cohen was a bright spot for the Hornets during the loss, with 60 receiving yards and a couple of big chunk plays to give his team scoring opportunities.
“It’s frustrating because I feel like we had a lot going on in the 1st half,” said Broughton. “I think that it was a spot here or there that was keeping us from executing some play. We’re light on numbers and we’re building from here, but there’s still things to look forward to and there’s still things that we’re doing well.”
With heavy rain coming down, the game went into a 30-minute delay with Triton up 35-8 at the half.
Then when play eventually resumed, it was Ipswich native JD Greenleaf adding two rushing touchdowns late in the game for Triton to increase the final score to 48-8. The Vikings will now roll into next week, where they have a tough task ahead of them in a huge spot against Amesbury.
“I’m just happy that next week we’ll be playing Amesbury for the league title,” said Melanson. “We need to play this clean or even cleaner going forward.”
Triton 48, Manchester Essex 8
Manchester Essex (0-5): 0 8 0 0 — 8
Triton (3-3): 15 20 7 6 — 48
Scoring summary
T — Royce Whitney 6 rush (Ryan Sexton pass from Sam Harding)
T — Sam Harding 28 rush (Oran MacDonald Kick)
T — Harding 17 rush (rush ailed)
M — Conrad Garfield 5 rush (Kevin Heim pass from Porter Valeo)
T — Jerimiah Price 25 pass from Harding (MacDonald Kick)
T — Robert Merrill Jr. 52 punt return (MacDonald Kick)
T — JD Greenleaf 8 rush (MacDonald kick)
T — Greenleaf 30 rush (rush failed)
Individual Statistics
RUSHING: MANCHESTER ESSEX (11-59): Conrad Garfield 3-55, Kevin Heim 5-2, Noah Cohen 1-2, Porter Valeo 2-0; TRITON (27-289): Sam Harding 6-103, Royce Whitney 9-73, JD Greenleaf 4-55, Sebastian Garcia 3-35, Nate Ducott 1-10, Sawyer Gromko 1-7, Jaden Price 2-3, Ben Woodin 1-3
PASSING: ME — Porter Valeo 8-18-0-1, 82; T — Harding 2-2-1-0, 37
RECEIVING: ME — Cohen 4-60, Connor St. Laurent 2-14, Turner Valeo 1-5, Heim 1-4; T — Jerimiah Price 1-25, Gromko 1-12.