Santos, Peabody run all over Saugus

PEABODY – For Peabody High?s football team, Thanksgiving featured a plethora of individual achievements prior to the most rewarding moment of all, a team celebration at midfield following its 33-0 victory over Saugus. Coach Mark Bettencourt?s pre-game Hall of Fame induction preceded a monster outing from Doug Santos, whose third touchdown of the game (and 30th of the season) saw the feature back eclipse the 2,000-yard mark. “Offensive line cohesiveness, finding fullbacks that are willing to get in there and bang and a running back with a tremendous work ethic,” said Bettencourt when asked to dissect the successes of Santos. The second-year head coach deflected a lot of credit to his defense as well. “When you play in (snowy) conditions like this, everyone knows it comes down to winning the turnover battle,” said Bettencourt, whose unit recovered a fumble on the Sachems? opening drive. Santos opened the scoring on a 7-yard run shortly after intercepting a pass from Saugus? senior quarterback, Justin Winn. “They were having trouble moving the ball on us and once we found what we thought was a chink in their armor, we stuck with it,” Bettencourt said. Second-half runs of one and 27 yards capped Santos? sensational campaign, which lived up to the expectations he set for himself before the season. “My goal was to hit 1,500 rushing yards and once I hit that, I began focusing on reaching 2,000,” said Santos, who finished with 2,005 yards. As unselfish as they come, Santos also helped set up senior running back Billy Teehan?s first varsity touchdown, late in the second period, without stepping on the field. Facing a second-and-goal situation, Bettencourt called on Santos, who deferred in favor of his teammate who did the honors from the Sachems? 4. “He?s one of my good friends and he?s been through a lot so I felt I needed to do something to help him out,” said Santos. Bettencourt chimed in on the touching gesture. “Doug refused to go in. For a kid to do that while chasing a couple of milestones is really special. That?s what this team is all about.” Teehan would cap the scoring with 6:50 remaining when he and senior quarterback Michael Raymond hooked up on a 17-yard scoring pass.Saugus (6-5) was unable to gain any momentum, gaining just 120 yards of total offense against a stout Peabody (8-3) defense. Winn and fellow senior Dan Cacciola combined for 62 yards rushing. “We knew they were going to try giving the ball to Cacciola so our goal was to shut him down or at least bend and not break,” said Bettencourt. “Once we had success with that, our focus turned to Winn, who is an excellent runner as well. Today was not a day to pass the ball and our defense did a great job keeping their running game at bay.” Saugus coach Mike Broderick, who would not let Thursday?s outcome diminish what has been a strong bounce-back season, lauded the efforts of Santos, as well as the Tanners? defensive approach. “(Santos) is the best back we have seen and we knew coming in that he?d be a tough match-up. Peabody did a very nice job defensively and they deserve a lot of credit for that. It just wasn?t our day,” Broderick said.