Eagles soar to opening win over Peabody

DANVERS – St. John’s Prep’s football season wasn’t even half a minute old yet before “When The Saints Go Marching In” was blaring over the PA system at Cronin Memorial Stadium on Saturday.Tyler Coppola took the Eagles’ first snap of the season 63 yards for a touchdown and sent St. John’s on its way to a dominating 31-0 win over Peabody on a sun-splashed afternoon.St. John’s31Peabody0 “Tyler gets that big gain right off the bat and with them being a ball control team, I think it kind of put them in the hole a little bit,” Prep coach Jim O’Leary said. “We still have a lot to improve on, but I thought we were able to run the ball pretty well.”For the Tanners, it was a day of missed chances and ill-timed mistakes.Peabody kept the ball for most of the first half but saw one drive thwarted inside the Eagles’ 30 and another killed because of penalties. It was those mistakes that coach Scott Wlasuk was lamenting after the contest.”What disappointed me the most was the undisciplined penalties,” Wlasuk said. “That’s something that we won’t stand for as coaches. I am disappointed because the kids came out here ready to go. They meant business from the moment they came on the field.”Peabody won the toss and elected to defer, meaning St. John’s got the ball to begin things. A good kick return put the ball on the Eagle 37, from where Coppola took a handoff from Tommy Gaudet and raced untouched down the left sidelines to make it 7-0 just 20 seconds into the game.”They are just so big and fast and have such great athletes,” Wlasuk said. “They are a darn good football team.”Peabody responded with an efficient 11 play drive that took nearly five minutes off the clock and reached the Eagle 29 before the Prep defense stepped up and stuffed the Tanners to get the ball back with six minutes left in the quarter.St. John’s went right to work from its 32, driving the 68 yards on 12 plays, the bulk coming on a 27-yard completion to Dillon Gonzalez. Gaudet eventually capped the drive with a one-yard sneak early in the second to make it 13-0 Eagles.”Tommy did a good job of managing the game like we asked him to,” O’Leary said. “He had a nice game in his first start.”St. John’s got a short field on its next possession, starting at the Peabody 30 and needing only five plays to score when Gaudet threw a perfect strike to Luis Soto for a 29-yard touchdown and a 19-0 lead after a missed conversion rush.Peabody drove into Prep territory late in the second but the Eagles’ constant pass rush finally forced quarterback Jason Hiou into a mistake as Gonzalez picked off his first down pass to end a dominant half for the Eagles.”I don’t know why our blocking struggled so much,” Wlasuk said. “You can’t be successful when your quarterback doesn’t even have time to set his feet.”Peabody began the second half with another sustained march, driving 33 yards in nine plays to reach the Eagle seven before another blitz forced Hiou to throw before setting, and Johnathan Thomas picked off the pass in the end zone with 4:50 left.Three plays later, Gaudet kept on an option play and raced 75 yards up the middle to give the Eagles a 25-0 lead through three quarters. Alex Moore closed the scoring for the Eagles with 43 ticks left on a 30-yard run.