The last time Woodland played Seymour at DeBarber Field on Thanksgiving Eve a blanket of fog rolled in that turned the game into a nail-biting 36 – 35 Cats victory two years ago.
On Wednesday night in Seymour. the scene was quite similar, as a shroud of fog enveloped the field on this the seventh meeting of the holiday classic.
That’s about all the two games had in common, as Woodland used a lightning quick offense to throttle Seymour 55 – 32.
Seymour (1 – 8) struggled through an injury-plagued season and came out looking to end the season on a high note. Josh Tilton intercepted a Woodland pass on the first drive of the game and the Wildcats took it to the bank.
Connor Shugrue fired a 17-yard pass to Chris Sheppard and Jacob Drozd pounded it in from 27 yards out to give Seymour a 6 – 0 advantage with 9:33 left in the first quarter.
The Wildcats failed on a two point conversion try the first of four failed attempts and the eight points would have gone a long way at making this a one possession game down the stretch.
“Our kicker was out and the back-up kicker got injured in practice so we had no choice but to go for two after we scored,” said Seymour head coach Tom Lennon.
“Unfortunately we didn’t convert a lot of them. We just had no answer to DiBiase. He was the catalyst to their offense.”
Woodland got right back at it as Jack DiBiase (18 carries for 248 yards, four touchdowns) blasted his way into the end zone on a 42 yard burst. Brandon Fowler (103 of 106) extra points in his career split the uprights for a 7 – 6 Woodland lead.
Seymour went back on top when Shugrue (three touchdown passes) fired a five yard scoring strike to Donnel Lewis for a 12 – 7 lead with 10:47 left in the half.
Woodland went to work and carved out three more touchdowns before the half to open up a commanding 27 – 12 advantage at the half.
The Hawks scored 20 points in a span of six minutes with DiBiase out racing the Seymour defense on a 70 yard smoker and Fowler hauled in a 77 yard scoring strike from Steve Petracca.
Woodland got the ball back on a punt and with just 34 seconds left before the half Tyler Slapikas rambled 31 yards into the end zone to up the advantage to 27 – 12 at the break.
“We came in here fired up,” said Woodland head coach Tim Shea. “We wanted to take over the tempo of the game and scoring as quickly as we did allowed us to do that.”
Seymour drove the length of the field to open the second half with Shugrue hitting Lewis on a five yard toss. Another missed two point conversion made it a 27 – 18 deficit and the Hawks scored two plays later for a 34 – 18 lead when DiBiase broke several tackles going 31 yards to pay dirt.
Andrew Maloney recovered a fumble and one play later Woodland was back in the end zone courtesy of a Fowler 74 yard sprint to open a 41 – 18 lead with 3:11 left in the third quarter.
The Cats responded with a 16 play 78 yard drive that took 5:21 off the clock as Shugrue hit Mike Fraser on a five yard touchdown toss but the missed two point conversion failed to close the gap.
Joe Kuzia recovered the onsides kick as Seymour was back in business. Shugrue took it in from a yard out after the Cats pulled off its fifth fourth down conversion of the game to narrow the lead at 41 – 32.
The missed two point conversions were coming into play but Woodland had yet to sustain a drive over four plays in the game and still had 41 on the scoreboard.
With 6:11 left the Hawks moved the ball on an seven play drive their longest of the game as DiBiase went in on a five yards blast for a 48 – 32 advantage.
As time was running out Fowler took off on a 54 yard touchdown to put the final touches on the 55 – 32 win.
