Injuries Slow Sandwich Football

By: Dan Crowley
Published: 10/15/10

The injuries continued to pile up this week as the depleted Blue Knight (1-4, 0-2 ACL) football team struggled in a 35-6 loss at Falmouth (5-0, 1-0 ACL). Turnovers added to Sandwich’s woes as the Knights gave up the ball four times and the Clippers turned each occasion into points.

“The mistakes hurt us,” Sandwich Coach Bill Luette admitted. “When we put the ball on the ground or have it picked off, it just kills.”

Beyond the turnovers Friday night, injuries once again took center stage as the fourth SHS player this season went down with a broken leg and another suffered an eye injury.

“We have four guys with broken legs and another with a broken ankle,” the coach explained. “We have four guys out with concussions, not counting those who couldn’t start the season because of concussions. By the second half Friday night, we had just three starters left on the field. The kids are doing a good job, and you want the backups to get experience, but you don’t want to throw those guys into tough situations. I’m glad we have a bye this week; we need it.”
Falmouth led 6-0 at the end of the first quarter and took a 21-0 advantage into the locker room at halftime. The Knights moved the ball in the first half as quarterback Brenden Caldeira ran for 80 of his 88 yards for the night. However, Falmouth held the Blue Knight running backs to 13 yards on six carries.

Sophomore Zach Wagner got a chance to call the signals for Sandwich in the second half, calling his own number 13 times and running for 81 yards. Wagner scored the only Blue Knight touchdown of the night in the fourth quarter on a 4-yard run. The extra point failed.

Sandwich looked like they might get something going late in the game when they recovered an onside kick, but it proved too little too late as time expired before they could put any more points on the scoreboard.

Sandwich held a 14-7 advantage in first downs over the Clippers as they passed for just over 60 yards and ran for 190.
“When you lose, it eats at you,” the coach added. “The kids are doing the best they can and I’m proud of them. Never in all my years of coaching (16 years) have I seen anything like this. It’s not like the kids are out of shape or doing things that they’re not supposed to be doing. There are days when we practice that I look around and there are so many missing because they’re either injured, with the trainer, or they can’t dress. But we’re not going to quit. We’re going to do everything we can to win. Hopefully, we’ll have a few surprises in the second half of the season.”

The Knights enjoy a bye this week which will give the team some much needed rest and a chance for some of the injuries to heal. Sandwich heads to Wareham on the 22nd to face the Vikings who will take a 1-4 record into tonight’s game against Dighton-Rehoboth. Sandwich hopes to have Ryan Cook (concussion) and Ben Downey (quadriceps muscle) back on the field at Wareham.

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