GREENFIELD — Tionne Brown still remembers being on the sideline as a freshman and witnessing his Turners Falls High School teammates earning their third consecutive Turkey Day victory over rival Greenfield High School. He remembered how the players celebrated that third straight win, which was a record number of consecutive wins by the underdog Indians in the series’ history. He also remembers classmate Owen Ortiz turning to him with a message.
“I remember Owen Ortiz saying to me, ‘When we are seniors, that streak is going to be six games in a row,’” Brown recalled.
Brown did everything in his power to ensure that prediction would come true, playing perhaps the best game of his career to help lead the Indians to their biggest margin of victory over the Green Wave, 36-0, during the 90th annual game at Veterans Memorial Field on Thursday.
Offensively, the third-year starting quarterback sparkled, completing 6-of-11 passes for 187 yards and two touchdowns. Defensively, the senior safety picked off a pair of passes by Green Wave counterpart, Tyler Miner, and intercepted a third pass that he took back for a touchdown, but the play was called back due to a personal foul penalty prior to the pick. All of that made him an easy choice as the Greenfield American Legion Post 81 Most Valuable Player.
“Coach really put it in our heads, that this was it, because I don’t plan on playing after high school,” Brown said. “This was the last 44 minutes of football I was ever going to play in my life. It really means a lot, and I wanted to come out, go hard, and make as many plays as I could to help the team. I could put in the right situations, coach gave me a lot of plays, and this was fun.”
Turners Falls head coach Chris Lapointe said he was proud to have hit quarterback go out the way he did.
“To put him in at quarterback as a sophomore after never playing the position, and have him make the strides he has and finish it off with a day like today, it’s kind of a storybook ending,” Lapointe said. “He’s a great kid, tremendous athlete, and we knew he could throw the ball when we needed him to.”
Brown and company actually set a number of records on the day. Not only did the Indians run their winning streak to a record six games in the holiday rivalry (seven overall, including their regular season victory), they also broke the record for largest margin of victory, the previous best coming in 1976 when the Indians beat Greenfield, 36-6. The 36 points scored also matched the most points scored by Turners Falls in a Turkey Day game.
Greenfield’s 52-0 win in 1994 marked the largest margin of victory ever in the series, and is also the most points scored by a single team on Turkey Day. Greenfield still leads the all-time series, 59-23-8.
The defense also helped Turners Falls shut out the Green Wave for the first time since 1949. The Green Wave offense struggled throughout, never getting the running game going, which finished with just 64 yards, including sophomore back and 1,000-yard rusher RJ Byrd, who wound up with just nine yards on 15 carries. The Wave never got further than the Indians’ 27 yard line, and finished with more punts (six) than first downs (five). Captain linebacker Tahner Castine said that the team worked hard leading up to the game and he thought they might be in for something special.
“I thought we had a chance to shut them out because our intensity in practice all week was great, and we had the mindset that we needed to comein in and do what we had to do,” he said. “This just feels great.”
The Indians (11-1) made a statement on the game’s opening drive and it was the two friends who made the prediction three years ago that set the tone for what was to come. The Green Wave defense did a nice job on the first two runs of the day for the Indians, who faced third-and-10 from their own 40 to open he game, but Brown hooked up with Ortiz on a deep pass that went for 43 yards, and two plays later, Quinn Doyle took a handoff 17 yards for a touchdown. Brown found Ortiz in traffic on the conversion and the Indians had a 8-0 just 2 minutes, 16 seconds into the game.
Greenfield (3-7) looked like it might answer on its first possession, as Miner hooked up with Colin Kosuda for a 25-yard pass that moved the Wave to the Indians’ 35, but the drive ended two plays later when Brown got his first interception of the game, which came after huge pressure from the Turners Falls defense forced Miner to scramble.
The teams traded possessions from there before the Indians took over at their own 35 late in the first quarter. After two very modest running plays brought up a third down, Brown threw a dart to Ricky Craver who took off for a 62-yard score that made it 14-0 with 20 seconds left in the quarter.
The Green Wave’s ensuing possession ended with Miner’s second pick of the day, this time on a beautiful diving play by Will Roberge. Greenfield actually got the ball right back as Craver fumbled, but Miner was picked off for the third time of the day on the third play of the drive as Brown got his second of the day and returned it to the Greenfield 35. The Wave jumped offside on the first play of the drive, and on the play immediately following the penalty, Brown hit Ortiz on a 30-yard touchdown. Brown also hit Nick Croteau on the conversion attempt to stake the Indians to a 22-0 lead they took into the break.
“I’m disappointed,” Green Wave coach Mike Kuchieski somberly said. “Big plays killed us. We would get them third and long, and they would hit a big play and our heads would go down. That’s what happens you have so many young kids.”
Greenfield never threatened in the second half, running just one play inside Turners Falls territory after the break. The Indian, meanwhile, made it 30-0 on their first drive of the third quarter, a 10-play drive that ended with Jack Darling running into the end zone from 20 yards out. Doyle converted the two-point run.
Brown nearly had his third interception of the day on the Wave’s next drive, when he picked off a pass near midfield and took it back for a score, but the personal foul penalty negated the pick.
“It would have been cool to get that one,” Brown said.
The game went quietly for much of the rest of the way as those involved and in attendance were well aware of the outcome by this point. Turners Falls did tack on one more touchdown midway through the fourth quarter when Roberge took a handoff on a counter play and broke into the Green Wave secondary where he scampered 72 yards to paydirt. Turners Falls threatened one final time, driving to the Wave 2, but the Greenfield defense stiffened against some of the Turners Falls backup running backs and the Indians turned the ball over on downs. Greenfield got the ball back with 11 seconds and simply took a knee to end it.
Doyle finshed with 73 yards on 16 carries in his final game for Turners Falls, giving him exactly 1,500 this season. Jack Darling also played the final game of his career and finished with 58 yards on eight carries, giving him 715 on the season. Ortiz finished with two catches for 73 yards, while Craver added two catches for 83 yards.
Miner, playing in his final game, finished 2-for-12 for 51 yards and three interceptions in the loss, his other completion going for 26 yards to Owen Phelps. Miner also led the Wave rushing attack with 27 yards on six carries. Tyler Townsley played his final game and rushed for 21 yards before leaving with an injury, and Elijah Brown added seven yards.
The streak continues for the WMass champion Indians, but winning still doesn’t get old to the Powertown football fans, who joined the team on the field following the game to celebrate, and take part in the team’s cheer. And winning on Turkey Day means plenty to Lapointe, who was getting choked up after the game.
“It never gets old, that’s for sure,” he said. “These kids deserved it, they’ve worked hard all season. This was their final goal and I’m glad they achieved that.”