SOUTH HADLEY — It seemed as if the only team that was going to beat South Hadley on Friday night was itself.

The Tigers coughed up five, that’s right, five, turnovers — four fumbles and an interception — to a pesky Greenfield defense, each one injecting the Green Wave with spurts of energy throughout the contest.

Still, South Hadley managed to overcome the miscues, and behind 190 all-purpose yards and a touchdown from sophomore Noah Hambley as well as three total touchdowns from senior Julius Hebenth, the Tigers muscled their way to a gritty 27-14 win on their home field to earn their first win of 2024.

“It went well,” South Hadley head coach Brian Couture said. “We’ve got some things to work on, no doubt, some ball security issues. But we’ll take the win. It’s nothing that we can’t fix this next week before we go into Chicopee Comp. Otherwise, we definitely saw improvement from last week.”

Improvement is always a positive, especially this early in the season. Greenfield head coach Mike Kuchieski characterized his team’s performance the same way.

The Green Wave fell behind 14-0 early, but come the third quarter they cut their deficit in half and had the ball looking to perhaps tie the contest up.

The longtime man-in-charge of the green and white was pleased with the effort from his bunch on Friday night. And keeping the score within two touchdowns is an added bonus with the new MIAA rules, where more points are rewarded for a close loss.

“We competed, and I’m happier than a pig in poop, man,” Kuchieski said. “We competed. I think that we got better than last week, and that was the goal. And losing by 13, which is the key in the state tournament nowadays, is helpful. But we didn’t have that on our radar. We cared about us and how we were going to compete tonight, and we got a lot better than we did last week.”

The hosts got the scoring started late in the opening quarter, as Hambley kickstarted his big day on the ground by punching in a score from five yards out to cap off a nine play, 69-yard drive in just over four minutes. Sophomore kicker Cooper Wall blasted through an extra point to make it 7-0 with 44 seconds remaining.

Greenfield didn’t run more than five plays on its first four possessions of the game, and it punted on its ensuing drive following South Hadley’s touchdown. Hambley returned it 53 yards to set up the Tigers at the Green Wave 12-yard line, leading to one of junior quarterback Griffin Soderbaum’s two touchdown tosses to Hebenth.

A scoreless game tilted in favor of the Tigers, 14-0, in a blink.

“Having the three of them back there, Noah, Julius and Nehemiah [Marrin] is nice, because we can attack in any direction we want,” Couture said. “We don’t have just one running back, we have three. And we can get all three of them 100 yards, then great, let’s do it. They love being out there and they love working hard. They’re gonna keep going as long as we keep giving them the ball.”

Kuchieski inserted senior Mason Cummings into the game at quarterback in an attempt to spark the rather sluggish Greenfield offense. The Green Wave took over with six minutes, nine seconds remaining in the first half and kept the ball for nearly all of it.

Cummings darted down the right sideline for a 20-yard scamper on a 3rd-and-9 to ignite some life into the Greenfield sideline before another third-down run of 14 put them inside South Hadley’s 10-yard line.

On a 3rd-and-goal from the Tigers one, Cummings threw a slant to Caleb Murray, who made a strong catch in traffic to get the Green Wave on the board with only 11 seconds to go.

“The drive at the end of the first half, that was huge,” Kuchieski said. “We ate up the entire clock, and good offenses do that. I’m proud of my kids. We didn’t need to worry about South Hadley today, we had to worry about us. And it was about us.”

South Hadley’s first play of the second half was one of its four fumbles, which was quickly pounced on by Greenfield sophomore Gavin Arsenault. However, Cummings’ next throw was picked off by Hebenth at midfield.

The Tigers went down the field, Soderbaum found Hebenth for the second time and all momentum was restored on the South Hadley sideline. Hebenth added his third touchdown of the night from six yards out on the Tigers’ next drive, making it 27-6 at the end of the third.

“That’s exactly it, the way they responded from the adversity part is what you love to see right now,” Couture said.

Murray, who started the night at quarterback and split time at the position with Cummings, returned under center in the fourth quarter, and orchestrated a nine play, 62-yard scoring drive that was capped off by his own 5-yard touchdown run.

He then tossed a 2-point conversion to Jonathan Breor to put the Green Wave within that 14-point threshold the MIAA cherishes.

“We’re having fun with it,” Kuchieski said of his quarterback situation. “We kind of have an offense that works with one, and some plays that work with the other. They’re both great kids, they’re both competitors and they get along real well. It’s a nice situation, and they both had their moments and did great things tonight. We gotta get some other guys to make some plays and we should be good.”

Greenfield (0-2) hosts Frontier next Friday night for its home opener at Veterans Field at 7 p.m.

South Hadley (1-1) stays home once again next Friday, as it hosts Chicopee Comp at 7 p.m. for its annual Military Appreciation Night.