Warriors Continue to Struggle

The WHS football team had trouble sustaining any kind of offense against the North Haven Indians on Friday night. As a result, the Indians were able to take advantage of their offensive possessions and go on to win by a score of 21-7 at Fujitani Field.

On Wilton’s homecoming night, Indians’ sophomore wide receiver Kendrick Amaker had two touchdowns and two interceptions to lead the Indians’ offense. He also had 35 passing yards and had over 130 yards receiving.

“Amaker was the big difference tonight,” said WHS football head coach Bruce Cunningham. “He had a great game on both sides of the ball, has tremendous speed and really opened up the offense.”

Amaker opened up the scoring for the Indians with a 49 yard reception from senior quarterback Joe Schwab with just under four minutes to go in the second quarter. Wilton did everything they could to cover him but just could not prevent the touchdown.

“Our guys were where they should have been,” said Cunningham. “We just could not stop him tonight.”

In the first half, the Warriors could not generate any offense. Senior quarterback Jackson Wilbur threw three interceptions in the third quarter on three straight possessions, killing any kind of momentum that the Warriors had. The team also lost junior running back Mike Francia after he was hit hard receiving a punt.

Luckily, the Warriors were strong on defense to keep it a 7-0 game heading into the second half.

“Our defense was on the field a lot in the first half and throughout the game,” admitted Cunningham. “We had to keep putting our defense on the field because our offense was not consistent tonight. Luckily, they hung in there and kept us in the game.”

However, in the second half, the Warriors started to wake up. On their first possession to start the quarter, Schwab was picked off by Warrior defensive back Clay Helms.

After the interception, on their sixth play of the Warrior drive, Wilbur threw a 23-yard touchdown pass to senior wide receiver Jeff Liebowitz.  Liebowitz then kicked the extra point to tie the game up at 7-7.

“In the second half, we got our passing game going,” said Cunningham. “Our receivers got open and we started to have the right reads, something we severely lacked in the first half.”

Unfortunately, that would be all that the Warriors could muster as the Indians would go on to score 14 unanswered points. Amaker would have a 62-yard touchdown reception to start the fourth quarter and then sophomore running back Ryan Criscio would scored on a 2-yard TD run towards the end of the fourth quarter.

The Warriors play again next Saturday at Darien High School at 2:30 p.m.