BIDDEFORD — A bright and booming halftime fireworks display on Homecoming Weekend at Waterhouse Field left Hayden Owen of South Portland wondering if someone was banging cleats on the cement walls outside the visiting locker room.
The pyrotechnics turned out to be but a prelude for Biddeford, which nearly overcame a four-touchdown deficit before falling 42-28 to South Portland in a Western Class A football game Friday night.
An end-around by Owen for 18 yards on fourth down in the final two minutes led to a clinching touchdown for South Portland (5-2) after it appeared Biddeford (3-4) might get the ball back with a chance to tie or win.
“We were definitely feeling good (at halftime),” said Owen, whose team led 35-7. “But you play 48 minutes and you can’t take any minutes off or it will come back to bite you.”
South Portland scored on its first five possessions. Owens, playing quarterback in a wildcat formation, ran for 35 yards on the fourth play from scrimmage. He later caught a long pass down the right sideline from Nick Mezzanotte and turned it into a 73-yard score.
Matthew Stearns scooted 28 yards with a screen pass for another touchdown, then added scoring runs of 1 and 33 yards.
“You can’t just roll over these games,” Stearns said. “It’s Biddeford. This is one of my favorite teams to play because they always bring their A game. They’re a hard, scrappy team.”
The Tigers, with help from a facemask penalty on the kickoff, drove 50 yards for a score to open the third quarter. Quarterback Casey Twomey carried the final yard to make it 35-14.
Codie Ramos recovered an onside kick that caromed off a South Portland player and Biddeford went right back to business, with Twomey hitting Dominick Day on a slant for 40 yards to set up the first of two short TD runs by Capen Macomber. Suddenly it was 35-20 and South Portland had yet to run a play in the second half.
The rejuvenated Tigers forced South Portland to punt on consecutive possessions and pulled to 35-28 with 5:29 left when Macomber scored from the 4, then made a 2-point conversion.
“Everyone stepped up and did their job and we made a heck of a run,” said Twomey, who scrambled out of trouble several times when it seemed South Portland was about to salt the game away. “We played our butts off. I’m proud of what we did tonight.”
With Biddeford packing the line to thwart the Red Riots’ running, Mezzanotte (8 of 10 for 189 yards and two TDs) connected with Owen for an 11-yard completion to keep alive South Portland’s final drive. It seemed stalled at the Biddeford 19 on fourth-and-4 but Owen lined up wide right, came back to take a pitch from Mezzanotte and tight-roped down the left sideline before stepping out at the 1.
“We love that (play),” said South Portland Coach Steve Stinson. “I was trying to get it off the whole second half but we didn’t have field position to run it. They were certainly honing down on the run game at that point, so we knew if we could pop something out like that it would be successful.”
Owen scored from the 1 and Mezzanotte kicked his sixth PAT to make it 42-28 with a little under a minute and a half remaining.
“We knew Biddeford’s a proud football team and they play extremely hard,” Stinson said. “In the end we had a drive that we cashed in to put the game away. It was good to see that.”
South Portland ends its regular season against Portland next Saturday. Biddeford does likewise Friday night against Thornton Academy.
“We just made too many mistakes (early),” said Biddeford Coach Brian Curit. “We were doing a very poor job of tackling. I think we shored that up in the second half. I’m hoping at some point we can put a whole game together.”
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