To Portland football coach Jim Hartman, it was a case of “wrong team, wrong time.
“I sure wish we could have played them later in the season,” he said after reigning Class A champion Bonny Eagle ran away with a 68-14 win Friday night at Fitzpatrick Stadium.
Portland, which lost 34-14 to the Scots in last year’s state championship game, has started this season with three consecutive losses.
“We got ourselves rolling a bit last week, and then this,” Hartman lamented. “I think (Bonny Eagle) is way better than anyone else in the state. That’s a phenomenal team.”
Except for their first possession of the game, the Scots scored every time they got the ball.
“We have a lot of good offensive players and tonight they all made plays,” said Bonny Eagle Coach Kevin Cooper.
The Scots (3-0) used a well-balanced attack to build a 48-7 lead in the first half.
“We can throw the ball,” Cooper said. “We trust our quarterback, and we have a good batch of receivers, and we’ve got good running backs who can get in the end zone in a hurry.”
Bonny Eagle opened the scoring less than six minutes into the game when Connor Sirois threw a 50-yard pass to Alex Sprague.
About three minutes later, Nick Thorne went 67 yards up the middle on a trap play to make it 14-0.
Sprague got the second on his four touchdowns on the first play of the second quarter – a 9-yard run up the middle on fourth down.
Terion Moss returned the ensuing kickoff 88 yards for a touchdown, but the rest of the first half belonged to the Scots, who amassed 377 yards in the first two quarters.
Sirois completed 6 of 9 passes for 156 yards and three touchdowns, including scoring passes of 65 and 7 yards to Kordell Menard. Menard’s first touchdown came on Bonny Eagle’s first play after the kickoff return by Moss, and the second was on the first play after Will Whyte recovered a fumble at the Portland 7.
A 27-yard punt return by Menard helped set up a 3-yard touchdown run by Sprague. Then the Scots tacked on another score when Thorne, a 220-pound senior, rumbled 88 yards down the right sideline.
Because of Bonny Eagle’s big lead, the entire second half was played with a running clock.
Sprague scored on 19-yard run to complete an eight-play, 66-yard drive after the second-half kickoff. Moments later, Whyte returned a fumble 2 yards for a touchdown that extended the Scots’ lead to 61-6.
Early in the fourth quarter, Portland’s Sam Knop threw a 13-yard scoring pass to Griffin Foley.
Nate Ferris capped the scoring with a 19-yard run for the Scots.
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