FARMINGTON — When Brunswick Coach Dan Cooper was told that Will Bessey had 37 carries Friday night, he laughed.
“Is that how many he had?” Cooper asked.
A week after leaving a game because of a hip injury, Bessey, the leading rusher in Class B North, showed no signs of injury. Bessey rushed for 213 yards, helping the Dragons earn a 27-16 win at Mt. Blue on a cold night at Caldwell Field.
“We got the win, and I’m feeling great right now,” said Bessey, who had 20 carries in the second half as the Dragons maintained a slim lead.
Brunswick is 6-1 and Mt. Blue is 5-2. Brunswick held a four-point lead through most of the second half until quarterback Thomas Hanson scored on a 3-yard run with 4:40 left. Mt. Blue’s last chance ended when Ben Palizay intercepted a pass at the Brunswick 35 with just under a minute to play.
Brunswick scored on its first drive, taking seven minutes off the clock. Hanson hit Jackson Gordon for an 11-yard touchdown pass with 3:22 left in the first quarter.
On the second play of the ensuing Mt. Blue possession, Palizay intercepted a Ryan Pratt pass at the Brunswick 30 and returned it to the 5. Two plays later, Bessey scored on a 3-yard run, and the Dragons had a 13-0 lead.
“When you spot someone a 13-zip lead early in the first quarter, and they’re as good as Brunswick is and as capable of running the ball like they are, it makes it uphill,” Mt. Blue Coach Jim Aylward said.
The Cougars answered early in the second quarter on Pratt’s 1-yard keeper. The touchdown was set up by a 43-yard run by Nate Pratt-Holt. Alex Gilbert ran in the 2-point conversion.
Brunswick scored with 4:25 left in the first half on Jesse Devereaux’s 3-yard run. The ensuing kickoff was short, and Quinn Guistra caught it at his own 35 and went 65 yards up the middle of the field for a Mt. Blue touchdown. Zach Meader’s conversion run made it 20-16.
The Cougars recovered a Bessey fumble inside their own 5 late in the half and appeared to carry that momentum into the second half, driving deep into Brunswick territory. Mt. Blue had first-and-goal at the 9, but the drive stalled at the 4.
“I told the kids I thought we played really well through the initial punch to the face, but when you’re playing uphill against a good team that has the ability to control the clock and churn our first downs like they did, it makes it tough,” Aylward said.
Relying heavily on Bessey, the Dragons ate time off the clock. Normally a two-way starter, Bessey didn’t play on defense. Cooper said he didn’t plan to use Bessey so much on offense, but since he was running well, the Dragons went with it.
“They never really stopped us when we were in that set. He was getting 5 or 6 yards a run, and eventually he started getting some bigger ones,” Cooper said. “It’s when we got out of that set is when we got stopped.
“He was feeling good, running hard, so we kept feeding him. He sucked it up, and he was a warrior tonight.”
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