BRUNSWICK — When Owen Richardson is carrying a football, it takes a while to wrestle him to the ground.
But once there, he pops up as if the field is electric. His tacklers, meanwhile, arise slowly, even more so as the game progresses.
“The coaches and Brunswick alums have always taught us to run hard,” Richardson said. “When you run hard as a running back, they don’t want to tackle you. Makes my job easier and makes the linemen’s job easier. We’ve had that beaten into our heads for years.”
With Richardson rumbling between the tackles and Mitch Lienert sweeping wide around the ends, Brunswick ground out a 27-14 victory over Windham in Class B North Friday night at Whittier Field on the campus of Bowdoin College.
Because of a renovation project involving their field, the Dragons (3-0) celebrated homecoming with the second of three planned home games on the college’s new artificial surface. Windham dropped to 2-1.
The Dragons scored in every quarter and managed to overcome 14 penalties resulting in 110 yards. Richardson ran for 134 yards and a touchdown and Lienert added 185 yards and two scores.
“That was unusual,” Brunswick Coach Dan Cooper said. “Usually we execute pretty good and we don’t have a lot of penalties. But the kids were able to fight through it.”
The Dragons put together scoring drives of 54 and 78 yards in the first half despite being flagged 10 times. Richardson ran in from 4 yards for the first touchdown and Lienert from 7 yards after an inadvertent whistle negated a second Richardson TD.
Windham might not have scored in the first half except for an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on the Brunswick sideline just before the Eagles were about to punt. Instead, sophomore quarterback Will Ledbetter engineered a 73-yard scoring drive capped by a toss of 3 yards to Nick Garrison to make it 13-7 at intermission.
After stopping Windham’s initial possession of the third quarter, Brunswick shrugged off two holding penalties and moved 71 yards with Lienert scoring from just outside the 1. The third of Cam Folsom’s successful PAT kicks made it 20-7.
Not even Windham pulling off a fake punt that Ben Elliot converted into a 21-yard gain disrupted the Dragons, who answered with an accidental fake punt of their own. Chandler Coombs, realizing his kick would be blocked, instead scampered right for 7 yards and a first down.
Cody Larson scored from 8 yards late in the fourth quarter for Brunswick and Windham answered with another Ledbetter touchdown pass, of 15 yards to Colby Mizner, to make it 27-14 with 2:35 left.
Windham’s Jayden Gonsalves recovered an onside kick for one last Eagles chance, but a Noah Goddard interception sealed the victory.
“They’re good,” Windham Coach Matt Perkins said. “They run a few plays and they execute them very well. To get a scout team in one week to run what they do is near impossible.”
Windham is two years removed from playing in the Class A state championship game and Brunswick was the Class B runner-up last fall.
Next week Brunswick travels to Fairfield to play Lawrence High and Brunswick travels to Brewer.
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