Big second half lifts Goffstown past Exeter in D1 football final (video)

DURHAM – As the final seconds ticked away on Sunday’s Division I football championship, Justin Hufft stood on the sideline, clothes soaked and a look of disbelief on his face.

Later on, outside the locker room of his Goffstown High School team, someone asked Hufft what flavor Gatorade some of his players had dumped on him. The coach laughed and speculated it was just water.

Whatever it was, it was a sign of the unthinkable – the Grizzlies were D1 champions, after beating Exeter 42-14 at Cowell Stadium at the University of New Hampshire.

Goffstown (12-0) ran for 288 yards and broke a halftime tie with four touchdowns in the second half on the way to the program’s first football championship.

“It is unbelievable,” Hufft said. “I never would have predicted that Goffstown could have done this at Division I. We had a lot of things go our way. We had a great senior class. We won some tight games this year.

“I’m almost speechless. I knew we had good players, but everybody has good players. We were able to keep this group together and they worked hard. I never would have thought this was possible.”

Connor Bourque rushed for 211 yards and three touchdowns, while Casey Gervais added 76 yards and three scores of his own on the ground, as the Grizzlies took control of the game after halftime. Exeter tied it 14-14 with 12 seconds to go in the second quarter, but Goffstown scored on its first four possessions after the break to pull away.

“It’s a one-two punch with Gervais and Bourque,” Exeter coach Bill Ball said. “They’re obviously pretty good up front. They got us in the C-gap there. Once (Bourque) got to the second level, he was a problem. If you get him in the first level, we had some success, but once he got to the second level, he’s a quick back.”

The Goffstown senior opened the scoring with a 32-yard touchdown run on the Grizzlies’ first drive, and added runs of 44 and 33 yards, respectively, in the second half.

“Second half, we came out and capitalized on the little mistakes,” Bourque said. “We didn’t change the game plan up, we just capitalized on their mistakes.

“The past three years, I don’t know if any other quarterback can compare with Casey, how we work on and off the field. It just comes like second nature. It just works. We’re paired very well.”

The Grizzlies were able to run the ball so well that they didn’t need the passing game, as Gervais was 3 of 5 for 18 yards and an interception.

Exeter quarterback Kyle Ball had more passing yards on his first two completions, as he went 8 of 19 for 107 yards with two interceptions, both of which came in the second half by Goffstown’s Andrew Duval. Goffstown also recovered an Exeter (9-3) fumble in the second half to win the turnover battle.

“The last two weeks, we forced eight fumbles and didn’t recover any of them,” Hufft said. “A little bit of buzzards luck, so we knew that was going to change eventually if we could stay after it. We got turnovers in the second half.”

In the first half, the Blue Hawks had the lone turnover, when Hunter Long picked off a Gervais pass intended for Duval. Exeter turned the miscue into points, going 68 yards on 11 plays and finding the end zone on a 5-yard run by Ball to tie the game 7-7 with 1:46 left in the first quarter.

The Goffstown offense stalled on its next drive, but a great special teams play by the Grizzlies pinned Exeter back at its own 1-yard line. The Blue Hawks went three-and-out, giving the ball back to Goffstown at the Exeter 31.

The Grizzlies took advantage of the short field, scoring on a 2-yard run by Gervais to go up 14-7, but Exeter came back again, this time with a 12-play, 78-yard drive that ended in a 1-yard run scoring run by Ball.

Three plays before that, on fourth-and-7, Ball found Long along the sideline, and the Blue Hawks tight end made a one-handed grab with Goffstown’s Zach Comeau in great coverage.

“We had good coverage on it, but the kid threw a long pass and he made a great catch,” Hufft said. “You’ve got to account for that to happen when you’re playing a good team. Those things happen. They made plays, but I told the kids, we have playmakers and we want to make plays in the second half.”

Bourque made one to open the third quarter, giving the Grizzlies the lead for good when he found a hole on the right side and outran the Exeter defense to the end zone for a 44-yard score.

Goffstown forced a punt and took over at its 47, and it was more Bourque, as he carried the ball seven times on the 10-play drive. Gervais finished the possession off with a 5-yard run and a 28-14 lead.

“We were clicking on all cylinders at the end,” Gervais said. “Connor is just an athlete. If you give him a little bit of space, he’ll score. That second half, we came out just ready to play. Duval came up huge with those interceptions.”

The first pick by Duval came on Exeter’s next drive, as the Blue Hawks got down to the Goffstown 41. But on the final play of the third, Ball’s throw to Long was off the mark and Duval made the interception, returning it to Exeter’s 30-yard line.

Two plays later, Gervais scored from 5 yards out to put the Grizzlies ahead 35-14 with 11:33 to play. The Blue Hawks fumbled on their next possession and Bourque scored from 33 yards out on Goffstown’s first play to put the game away.

“I don’t even know, it just feels so good,” Gervais said. “In the locker room (at halftime), we just kept saying ‘this is our game.’ Penalties were killing us. We had to clean it up and we’d win this game. There was nothing major, we just had to do our job.”