Quigley’s late return pays off as Marblehead defeats Hingham

MARBLEHEAD – With the game on the line, Marblehead’s Will Quigley wanted the ball. Fortunately, his coach listened to his plea.Quigley, who normally doesn’t play on the kickoff return team, took a kick back 77 yards with 4:13 left to play for a touchdown that gave the Magicians (3-1) a 22-19 win over Hingham, Friday night, at Piper Field.”We try to give the kids who play both ways a break on special teams, but Will came to me, put his hand on my shoulder and said ‘Coach, put me in there,'” Marblehead coach Jim Rudloff said.Quigley (260 total yards) also scored on a 72-yard pass fro m Gus Percy on the first play from scrimmage and on a 15-yard run, and had two more touchdowns nullified due to holding penalties. Sam Benger’s 66-yard touchdown run highlighted a second half rally for the Harbormen (1-3), who took their first lead at 19-15 when quarterback Reed MacLeod snuck in from the 1-yard line with 4:26 left in the game to cap off a drive that was set up by a 33-yard punt return by Richard Sullivan and a personal foul on the Magicians.Lining up on the right side, Quigley hauled in the ensuing kickoff, found some room and then made a move at midfield that suddenly gave him an open lane down the sideline. Christian Flores’ extra point kick gave Marblehead a 3-point lead.Hingham was forced to go for a first down on 4th-and-4 from its own 34, but Benger was gang-tackled for no gain on a sweep to the right, and the Magicians ran out the clock, with Percy picking up a key first down with a sneak on 4th-and-inches.”After last week’s loss to Winthrop, we felt like we needed a win over a quality team to prove ourselves,” Rudloff said. “In the second half, the ghosts started to come back a little bit, but a victory is a victory.”The Magicians dominated the first half, out-gaining Hingham, 236-140. Percy lobbed a pass to Quigley at midfield on the first play of the game, and Quigley ran the rest of the way. Ian Maag’s 2-point conversion pass to Philip Coughlin put the Magicians on top, 8-0, just 40 seconds into the game.After a 15-yard touchdown run by Quigley was negated by a penalty, Hingham drove the ball 78 yards in seven plays, with Kevin McCarthy scoring from the 3 to make the score 8-6, with 7:43 left in the first half. The Magicians answered with a 66-yard drive that included a terrific catch by Jeremy Gillis for a key first down, and then a 15-yard scoring run by Quigley to give Marblehead a 15-6 lead with 17.3 seconds remaining in the first half.”He (Quigley) breaks a lot of tackles,” Hingham coach Paul Killinger said. “It seemed like a lot of the yards he picked up were after we made initial contact. We had the kids there to hit him. He just kept going.”A 42-yard touchdown by Quigley on a screen pass was wiped out by a penalty on Marblehead’s first drive of the second half. Neither team seriously threatened again until Benger broke a tackle in the backfield on a sweep, and then raced down the right sideline for a touchdown that with John Fisher’s extra point kick made the score 15-13 with 9:36 left in the game.Marblehead picked up one first down but had to punt, and Sullivan’s return and the 15-yard penalty gave the Harbormen possession at the Magicians’ 13-yard line.MacLeod barely made it into the end zone four plays later, setting the stage for Quigley’s dramatic kickoff return.