Winthrop 41, Revere 13: Milano the hero as Vikings clinch winning season

Mario DiNitto / For the ItemWINTHROP – For Massachusetts high school football teams, the Thanksgiving game represents a day which teams can either redeem or lose their entire seasons. Winthrop and Revere have each had their struggles this year. However it was the Vikings who cured their seasons’ ills with the elixir of a win in front of their home crowd at Miller Field, 41-13.Click here to see a photo gallery from the Revere/Winthrop game.For Winthrop, the hero this year was Will Milano. The senior captain and quarterback was all over the field on both offense and defense to lead the Viking charge. Milano finished the game completing 11 of 19 passes for 188 yards and two touchdowns. While the clock was winding down in the first half, Milano extinguished two Revere drives by recovering a fumble and also making an interception.”Milano has been a three year starter for us, captain this year, and he really stepped up,” said Winthrop coach Sean Driscoll. “We expect our seniors to step up and he did that today. He is a very competitive kid and I am very proud of what he did today.””Congratulations to Winthrop,” said Revere coach Lou Ciccatelli. “We knew they were a good team coming in. They have had their injuries like us this year, but we knew with them being health today they were going to be a tough team to beat. We knew we had our work cut out for us today.”The game started with a bang for Winthrop (5-5) as it forced Revere (2-9) to punt on its opening possession. The punt was returned by senior James Evans 50 yards for a touchdown. The score put Winthrop up early 7-0 before Revere could even blink.The conditions on the field, despite the balmy 46-degree temperature to start the game, were sloppy. Rains heading into the game made for a muddy track in between the hash marks. Using their home field advantage, Winthrop came out throwing the ball on designed rollouts to outside the hash marks where the ground was less slick and provided better traction.In the first half, while helping Winthrop build a 29-7 lead, Milano completed seven of 13 passes for 138 yards. Milano found Nick McCarthy in the first quarter for a 12-yard touchdown to complete a 10-play drive.Later in the half, Milano’s throwing and the hard inside running of Frank Ambrosino led to a Rob Deeb 25-yard field goal and Ambrosino finding the end zone on a six-yard dive. Ambrosino’s touchdown was set up by Milano’s interception just before intermission. Ambrosino finished the day with 54 yards rushing and two touchdowns.”Outside the hashes is what we thought were in better shape,” said Driscoll. “Believe or not we had this field sodded this year, but the field just didn’t dry like it should. We wanted to go out there.”Comparatively, Revere attempted to get their running game going with bruising running back Trea Weathers. Weathers managed to pile up 58 yards in the first half on 14 carries. He struggled with his footing on the poor surface and in some cases was limited in the cuts he was able to make. W eathers finished the game with 114 yards rushing and a one-yard touchdown plunge in the first half.”We told our guys heading into the game that (Weathers) was a tough kid to tackle and they needed to get low on him. I thought our defensive line did a great job trying to contain him today,” said Driscoll.For Revere, first half turnovers and penalties led to a steep hill to climb in the second half. In the second half, Revere was able to dominate ball possession, but could not convert drives into touchdowns.”It has been the kind of year where we keep shooting ourselves in the foot,” said Ciccatelli. “Even after the half, being down 29-7, I thought we were still in the game because we were able to move the ball up and down the field.”Meanwhile, Winthrop only found itself with three true possessions in the second half. On their two possessions of the third quarter, the Vikings managed to score touchdowns. The first was Milano finding Deeb in the end zone from four yards out,