SOUTH HAMILTON — A 22-point second half lifted the Bishop Fenwick football team to a 34-7 win on the road at Hamilton-Wenham Saturday afternoon.
The Crusaders have plenty of offensive weapons and they made sure to use all of them. At quarterback Chrys Wilson (5-of-9, 74 yards, one touchdown) and Jason Romans (4-of-9, 61 yards) led the way. The running back duo of David Cifuentes (14 carries, 96 yards, one touchdown) and Tucker Destino (12 carries, 60 yards, two touchdowns) dominated the ground while Angel Martinez caught five passes for 97 yards and one touchdown.
“Tucker has been great for three years,” Fenwick coach Dave Woods said. “He’s had a hard time getting the touches he can because of the guys in front of him. Anytime he does anything he does it 100 percent. He gives a great effort and he’s talented. It was nice to see him get in the endzone a couple of times.
“It’s going to get easier and easier,” Woods said of dividing up the snaps between players. “We’re going to go with guys that want to play, work hard and know what they’re doing. I’m thinking it will get easier.”
Fenwick’s defense had its hands full with Generals quarterback Ian Coffey. The Crusaders’ experienced front got consistent pressure but Coffey always seemed to scramble out of trouble.
“I don’t know if anyone tackled (Coffey),” Woods said. “Maybe the secondary did a good job because he didn’t have anyone to throw to running around back there. He’s talented and their running back, Colby Cala, we didn’t do a good job of tackling him either.
“They’re well-coached,” Woods said. “They’re young upfront, that shows, but once they get up to speed a little bit they’re going to be a tough team. We’re experienced with our front four. Going against them that was an advantage. We wore them down to get a little more of a pass rush.”
It didn’t take long for either team to get on the board. Fenwick took the opening drive and scored on a 13-yard pass from Wilson to Martinez. The Generals came right back and scored on a 5-yard run from Coffey to take a 7-6 lead after an extra point.
Cifuentes ran for a 23-yard touchdown later in the half to put the Crusaders ahead 12-7 before the break.
In the second half some heavy rain changed the Crusaders’ plans on offense. Fenwick kept things on the ground with Wilson, Cifuentes and Destino- and the Generals had no answer.
Destino added a pair of touchdowns on the ground with a 23-yard and a 14-yard run and Wilson ran in a 2-point conversion to stretch Fenwick’s lead to 28-7.
“It’s always good to get the quarterback under center and just hand the ball off to someone that’s going to run hard,” Woods said. “Chrys is great. He’s a smart kid, understands how to read defenses and knows what we’re trying to do. Chrys is a football player.”
From there the Fenwick defense did its job, scoring a touchdown on an interception on the last play of the game to seal the 34-7 win.
“You have to show up and play football,” Woods said. “You can’t just turn it off and on. That’s what we tried to do and that doesn’t work. We’ll correct that.”
The Crusaders (2-0) host Wilmington Friday (7).