Last Thursday night, Concord Carlisle traveled to Woburn for a non-league bout with the Tanners. In the first game between the two programs since a CC playoff win in 2015, Woburn proved to be a tough foe. After forcing a punt on CC’s first possession, the high powered Woburn running game (which finished with 280 yards of rushing on the day) got revved up with an 12 play, 79 yard drive that ate up almost 8 minutes of the quarter. The drive ended with a 7 yard Woburn TD by junior Tanners RB Bryan Ferreira and an 8-0 Tanners lead. Ferreira was an handful for the Pats defense all day long with 172 yards on the day (only the 2nd opposing back to gain 100+ yards against CC in the ’22 campaign). The CC offense responded with a couple of first downs but a penalty stalled the drive and the Pats had to punt early in the 2nd quarter. On the ensuing drive, the Tanners rushing game again proved difficult to contain with a 13 play 73 yard drive. But CC’s defense stiffened inside the 10 and forced a Tanners field goal to push the Woburn lead to 11-0 at the half.
The 3rd quarter opened up with another long Tanners drive deep into Patriots territory. But the CC defense held with open field tackles by senior DB Ryan Martines and junior DL Aengus Wilson forcing a 3rd and long at the CC25 where sophomore DB Matthew Carleton stepped in front of a Woburn pass for an interception and a 20 yard return to halt the drive. But the tough Tanners defense came up with their own turnover and forced a fumble on the next play. Four plays later a 16 yard TD run by Ferreira pushed the Woburn lead to 18-0. The Tanners defense came up with an interception on the ensuing Patriots possession and, only one play later, Woburn converted the turnover into a 4 yard TD and a 25-0 lead. Woburn added a field goal to push the lead to 28-0 midway through the final quarter.
But, as they have all year long, CC fought to the end. After a 58 yard scamper by Jr. RB/LB Ryan DeMayo set the Pats up at the Tanners’ 2 yard line, Sr. RB/DB Blake Newcomb scored to cut the lead to 28-7. After CC recovered the ensuing onside kickoff, the Patriots drove 38 years to cut the lead to 28-14 with another Newcomb rushing TD. The key play in the drive being a big 4th and 19 conversion with a 20 yard “hook and lateral” with senior QB Holden Miller hitting sophomore WR/DB Will Hoover with a 10 yard strike and Hoover lateraling the ball to Newcomb, who scampered for 10 more yards to move the sticks. But CC ran out of time after Woburn ran out the clock to make the final score 28-14.
The Patriots finish out the 2022 campaign with the big Thanksgiving Day clash at Lexington.
