Swampscott football team gets ready for AC in playoffs

For anyone playing high school football in Massachusetts, having a practice scheduled for the weekend after Thanksgiving is a good thing because it means that team has made the postseason and still has a shot at a championship.It had been four long years since Swampscott coach Steve Dembowski could go to his players and tell them they had practice on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. But that’s exactly what the Big Blue wanted to have coming into the season.And now Swampscott sits only one win away from making a trip to Gillette Stadium in Foxborough next Saturday for the Division 3A Super Bowl. But to get there, the Big Blue need to beat Catholic Central Large champion Arlington Catholic on Tuesday (7) at Arlington Memorial Stadium.”This has been our goal since the beginning of the season,” Dembowski said. “We wanted to get to the postseason and win the whole thing. We’ve reached three of our goals and now we only have one left.”In any other year, however, the Big Blue wouldn’t have been making a bus trip to Arlington on Tuesday night.Before this season, the Northeastern Conference was only a one-division league and with Gloucester going unbeaten and handing Swampscott its only loss (21-14 at Blocksidge Field), it would have been the Fishermen in the Division 2A playoffs and the Big Blue sitting on the sidelines.But with the addition of Peabody, the NEC split into large and small divisions and thanks to a 5-0 record in the South (or small) division, the Big Blue were able to clinch their first postseason berth since 2003.”We knew that we had a good team coming into the season but we had to get better each week,” Dembowski said. “And the team is playing really well right now.”In some ways, the loss to Gloucester on October 6 was the medicine the Big Blue needed to get to Tuesday. The high-powered Fishermen, who have a playoff game of their own with Masconomet on Tuesday (4) at Lowell’s Cawley Stadium, took advantage of several mistakes by Swampscott to come away with a win in a game that Dembowski feels his team should have won.”I think that was the game that proved a lot of the things that we were doing wrong,” Dembowski said. “There were a lot of obvious (ones) with penalties and missed tackles, but we’ve played a lot better since then. And I think that sparked a strong second half for us.”One of the reasons for the Swampscott resurgence in the second half was the emergence of the Swampscott offense, led by all-NEC South quarterback Peter Kinchley.Kinchley engineered an offense that put up 257 points in 11 regular-season games, culminating with a 42-point performance on Thanksgiving against Marblehead, which saw the Big Blue score touchdowns on their first six possessions of the game.”Peter has developed into one of the best quarterbacks in the area,” Dembowski said. “We played well against Marblehead and when we play like that, we’re tough to beat.”Another reason for the offense coming around is the play of an offensive line that has allowed very few teams to put pressure on the quarterback and has allowed the development of the Big Blue’s skill players on the outside and in the backfield.”The offensive line has been so strong and they’ve played well throughout the year,” Dembowski said. “And the development of the skill players has made us come together.”The Swampscott defense also has progressed through the season, allowing just 143 points in 11 games. But Dembowski knows that that unit will have its hands full with a team that comes in at only 7-4, but has won six games in a row and has put up 305 points this season.”AC has some good athletes and a pretty good-sized offensive line,” Dembowski said. “Their offense has been putting up points all year, so it looks like it’s going to be a good game.”