Sachem East's early and promising 4-0 start is fading fast. The Arrows dropped their third straight contest Saturday, losing 42-0 to Lindenhurst on the road.
Lindenhurst sophomore Brad Witkowski threw for 180 yards and three touchdowns.
Witkowski hooked up with receiver Alec Wrieth early and often in the first half, as the Bulldogs (5-2) built a 21-0 halftime advantage. Wrieth caught four of Witkowski’s 14 completions for 116 yards and two touchdowns.
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“Alec has had a great year,” said Lindenhurst head coach Nick Lombardo. “We’re really waiting for Brad to really understand our offense. We felt like it came together and was improving every single week. Fortunately for us, we were able to stop shooting ourselves in the foot with mistakes and he threw the ball real well today.”
The Flaming Arrows (4-3) had as much trouble on offense early on, amounting for just 81 yards of total offense in the first half. Right before halftime, running back Steven Casali went off with an apparent leg injury. Though he returned for the second half, he remained ineffective, and finished the day with just 11 carries for 25 yards.
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“He just had a stinger,” said Sachem head coach Mark Wojciechowski. ”After we were down 35, there’s no need to put him in a position where he’s going to hurt himself.”
Witkowski and Wrieth connected on a 34-yard scoring strike on the game’s opening drive to give Lindenhurst a 7-0 lead. Sachem’s inability to run the ball forced them to surrender the ball back to the Bulldogs in all three of their first half drives. After getting possession back, Witkowski led a 12-play, 65-yard drive that was capped off by Wrieth’s second touchdown reception of the day from seven yards out to double Lindenhurst’s lead to 14-0.
“What we did today, offensively, we scored on the opening drive and set the tone,” said Lombardo. “We didn’t really give them an opportunity to give it to Casali, who’s a real good football player. When you’re playing from behind, it’s tough to give a guy like that the ball that many times. We controlled the momentum and the tone of the game which made it tough for him to get involved.”
Witkowski, who completed 14 of 17 passing attempts, found Wrieth again on the first play of their next possession down the sideline for 44 yards, setting up a first and goal situation. On third down, the sophomore found Ken Skon in the end zone to make it 21-0.
The loss sets up a do-or-die season finale for the Flaming Arrows against Brentwood next week. With a win, and some luck, they could advance to the postseason for the first time since 2008.
“Unless we bounce back from this and really refocus and understand what we need to get done, it doesn’t matter,” said Wojciechowski. “If we don’t get back to how we got those four wins, it doesn’t matter what we do, we’re not going to have success.”
With the victory, Lindenhurst has all but assured themselves a spot in the playoffs, and have their sights set on hosting a first round game. Standing in their way, however, is Sachem North, who they’ll host next Saturday.
“When you’re talking about who’s playing who and where, now we give ourselves an opportunity to play at home [in the playoffs] if we win next week,” said Lombardo. “We talked about the importance of this game based on who we played and who they played. Now we play Sachem North, and we’ve given ourselves a shot. That’s all you really want, is that shot to play that home [playoff] game.”
