Bulldogs ‘spread’ the wealth in Holey’s first season

LYNN – Everywhere you look these days in football, the spread offense has become the in vogue thing to do.Whether its Texas Tech’s aerial circus or West Virginia’s Pat White running into the history books for college quarterbacks, the spread has allowed teams to get their best athletes on the field.For first year Lynn English coach Peter Holey and offensive coordinator Brian Vaughan, the spread was the best choice to take advantage of the plethora of talented weapons possessed by the Bulldogs.Well, all the change in offense did was result in the Bulldogs having the fourth best offense, at 24.7 points per game, in the Northeastern Conference coming into Thursday’s game against Classical.But the Bulldogs saved their best for last against the Rams.Fowler threw for 203 yards and four touchdown passes while rushing for 30 yards as the Bulldogs steamrolled to a 48-14 win over Classical.”The offensive line did a great job of picking up the blitzes,” Fowler said. “And were taught that once you make a read to throw the ball.”The spread is built to get people’s hands on the ball and on Thursday that was certainly the case for English. Fowler completed 12 passes to six different receivers and all four of his touchdowns went to different players, each for 30 or more yards (30, 32, 34, 35).For most of the game, Fowler was able to sit in the pocket and decide where he wanted to go with the ball. And when the Rams were able to get pressure, Fowler found a way to elude the rushers and gain yardage.English also used several different formations to generate mismatches that wound up in Bulldog receivers running free in the Classical secondary on several occasions.Fowler’s first touchdown pass was a strike from 35 to Ryan Woumn, who caught eh ball at the five and eluded one Classical defender before reaching pay dirt. The second scoring toss was just as pretty as Fowler threw a strike to the school’s all-time leading receiver, Charlie Rucker, behind the defense to make it 27-0 late in the first half.”The start we got off to was shocking,” Fowler said. “But the coaches have made change that was needed here. And it showed us how to work hard and find success.”The spread also is designed to confuse a defense and with English leading 35-7, that’s exactly what happened.On first-and-10 at the Classical 32 with 2:35 left in the third quarter, Fowler faked a screen pass to his left. The defense bit for an instant and that was enough time for Justin Young to run past his man and Fowler found him in stride at the five for an easy touchdown that salted away the win for English.Perhaps English coach Peter Holey put it best about the general of his spread offense.”Jesse has been tremendous. He’s our foundation,” Holey said.uWith its 48-point output on Thursday, the Bulldogs finished the season as the fourth best scoring offense in the NEC this season. Their average of 27 points per game ranked behind only Gloucester (31.7), Swampscott (30.5) and Saugus (28.7).The defense, under coordinator Greg Brotherton, did them one better. After struggling early in the season, English finished third in the points allowed per game category at 17.5. Gloucester and Beverly were the only two with better marks.uThe day’s biggest hit came early in the second quarter when an English wide receiver leveled Classical defensive back Casey Johnson with a crushing block on a pass play. But the block was for naught as the Bulldogs were called for an illegal shift on the play.uThe paid attendance was over 1,600, one of the biggest crowds for the game in recent memoryuEnglish’s 7-3 record is the best for the program since going 8-2 and finishing second in the NEC behind Gloucester in 2004uThe Lynn Public Schools band, under the direction of Gil LaPointe and Joe Picano, entertained the crowd at halftime with their performance of The Wild, Wild West.