By Stephen Ham

Special to the Leader

Scarborough’s football program took a big hit Friday night, when the visiting Portland Bulldogs took advantage of Red Storm errors to win a squeaker, 13-12, before a large homecoming crowd on a cold, breezy night.

The Red Storm learned a hard lesson with this one; small mistakes add up to big problems.

After the game, Scarborough Head Coach David Sterling was asked what happened. A visibly angry Sterling said, “Some people weren’t paying attention to their assignments. One person goes offside and it ends up costing the team field position. One person doesn’t check the line at the line of scrimmage and we get called for an illegal procedure. If one person doesn’t do his assignment it costs the whole team, and that’s what happened tonight.”

The game started on a positive note for the Storm. Running behind an offensive line that was clearly larger than Portland’s defense, Scarborough running backs Brendan Ham and Peter Tuma had little difficulty moving downfield to the Bulldog 13. Seeing that Portland was selling out on run, quarterback Kyle Kelley made a beautiful touchdown throw on third down to tight end Kris Gergler, who was all alone in the left corner of the end zone giving Scarborough a 6-0 lead with 5:49 left in the first.

The point after attempt was missed, something that has bedeviled the Red Storm this year, and this one would come back to haunt them.

Portland’s offense, which seemed to consist of pitches to star running back, Ihmadhi Zagon, gained yardage in chunks behind the sophomore back, but was unable to put together any points until late in the half when quarterback Jason Strauss heaved a desperation pass downfield that was caught by Jake Alexander for a 45-yard gain. Two plays later Strauss again rolled right and hit Joe Sukowski in the end zone with 4:53 left in the half. After Portland’s extra point attempt was blocked the teams went into the half tied 6-6.

Scarborough came out of the break and got a huge momentum boost when tailback Brendan Ham took a handoff at the Red Storm 12 yard line, and after shaking off several Portland defenders on the left side of the line, reversed direction and exploded through the tiniest of holes. Ham then kicked into high gear and out raced the Bulldog secondary on his way to an 88-yard touchdown run and a 12-6 Scarborough lead.

The Storm elected to go for two points, but when Ham was brought down short of the goal line, Scarborough was still only up by 6.

Portland came right back on their next possession, and on a 13-yard run by Zagon with 3:53 remaining in the third, tied the score at 12-12. Carl Szanton connected on the extra point kick, which gave them the lead, and as it turned out the game, as the Red Storm could not score again. 

Scarborough had ample opportunities to score in the game, but the small things, procedural penalties and missed assignments, cost them field position time and again. Third and short became third and long, robbing them of chances to score. And penalties gave the Bulldogs new life after stalled drives.

This was a game where the team played well enough to win, but made enough mistakes to lose.

Matt Duquette, Sean Northgraves, and Garrett Aloffs played great pass defense, while Colin O’Connor, Nick Neugebauer, and Phil Christian all made key tackles to slow down the Bulldog attack. 

Sterling also commended the offensive line for their play. “Our offensive line played well. I knew they would coming into this game. Those guys play really hard and we need to get everyone to do the same.”

The Red Storm are at a difficult place as a program. They have the bodies, the athletes, and the talent to win, but the discipline is still lacking at times, along with the knowledge of how to win that is bred into a program over time. They have no respite, as a tough Marshwood team awaits next week, and the Storm most likely need to win to of their three remaining games to reach the playoffs.

As to what is next, Sterling said, “We go back to work this week. It’s that simple. If we want to correct mistakes and win, we have to work hard this week.”

The Red Storm fall to 3-2 with the loss, and travel to Marshwood  Friday, Oct. 10 at 7 p.m.