Pirate seniors won 20 games in two years
By Bob Nuse, Sports Editor
This was not the way the West Windsor-Plainsboro South football team wanted its season to end.
”It hits you like a Mack truck that it’s gone and you have nothing left,” Pirates senior quarterback Connor Farrell said after a 40-7 loss to Sayreville in the Central Jersey Group IV semifinals on Saturday. “It’s gone.”
The loss brought to an end a season that had seen the Pirates dominate the competition in posting 10 straight wins. But against Sayreville, South simply had no answers for a team that was better on both sides of the ball.
”They outplayed us,” senior running back David Twamley said. “We were prepared, but they just outplayed us. It’s a disappointment to end like this. It’s going to hurt for a little while. I just can’t believe it’s over. They came out and executed and we didn’t. They came out and made the plays.”
Added South coach Todd Smith: “We were clearly out-coached and outplayed. In every aspect of the game they had the advantage. They took it to us pretty clearly today.”
Sayreville had the ball three times in the first half on Saturday, scoring a touchdown on each possession. The Bombers used some superior play along the offensive line to spring their running backs for one long run after another in building a 21-0 halftime advantage. Sayreville had 212 yards in offense in the first half, all on running plays.
”They were executing well,” Farrell said. “They put a lot of pressure on us. They did a great job and they deserved this win.”
The Pirates had some success moving the ball in the opening half, but twice failed to convert on fourth down plays inside the 20-yard line. A couple of Pirate turnovers in the third quarter led to Sayreville touchdowns as the Bombers built a 33-0 lead. The lead grew to 40-0 before South scored on a Twamley touchdown run with 28 seconds left in the game.
”We went out and gave it our all, it just didn’t pan out for us today,” said Twamley, who finished with 174 yards rushing on 31 carries. “When I got in the end zone the last time it all hit me that that was my last carry. My first carry of my high school career was a touchdown freshman year. And now I go out with a touchdown. I just love these guys so much and I am going to miss them.”
Smith will miss this group of seniors, which has helped the program win 20 games the last two years.
”That is probably the best group of seniors to ever come through this school,” said Smith, who has led the Pirates to the playoffs four straight years. “The effort, the hard work, and the determination those kids displayed has been great. It stings right now, but a lot of high school football players would wish they could be like those guys.
”They’re a great group of kids. We’ll never have a group like this again. Not just with the way they played on the football field, but also the kind of kids they are off the field. They make the right decisions and the right choices. They’re all about the team.”
And that is what the Pirates will miss more than anything else. They won’t be getting together on the football field the next two weeks to prepare as a group for the CJ IV final.
”I’m still playing four more years at Penn starting next year, but this is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, leaving this behind,” Twamley said. “Connor and I have been best friends since kindergarten and there is a picture on our refrigerator of us when we were little just messing around. It’s hard to think this was the last game I’m ever going to play with him.”
It was hard to think this was the way their last game together would end. But on this day, the Pirates simply ran into a better team.