The Bristol Eastern football team reached its bye week with a 3-1 record after back-to-back comeback wins.
The Lancers came back to beat Farmington, 19-14, at home last Friday night on the home turf of Alumni Field. That followed a 17-14 non-conference home win over Pomperaug on Sept. 27 where Eastern trailed, 14-0, before scoring 17 straight points. The comeback wins were a big deal for the Lancers following a rough 18-17 loss to East Catholic on Sept. 19 at Cheney Tech in Manchester.
In the win over Eastern, Lincoln Bashaw did the grunt work on the ground (24 carries, 186 yards) while Alex Corvo (7-29 rushing) finished the job with a pair of touchdowns. Bashaw busted loose for a 50-yard touchdown run to open the scoring for the Lancers with 8:03 left in the first quarter. Corvo finished off drives in the third and fourth quarter with touchdown runs of one and two yards. Corvo’s first score, and a Gavin Damboise extra point, got Eastern to within 14-13 with 3:03 left in the third quarter.
Eastern trailed by one point until there was 4:05 left in the fourth quarter, when Corvo scored from two yards out for a 19-14 lead. The Lancers held on for a second straight comeback win.
Damboise may have gone 1 of 2 on extra points, but he was huge on special teams for Eastern. Three of Damboise’s four kickoffs (186 yards, 46.5 average) went for touchbacks. Damboise punted twice for 99 yards, or an average of 49.5 per kick.
The defense came up big for Eastern. Aidyn Davies had five tackles, including two for loss, and intercepted a pass. Randy Denoto had five tackles, including two for loss. Noah Albert and Honor Kim each had five tackles while Ryan Zavecz added three tackles. Jacob Rogers totaled three tackles, including two for loss, and Jacob Kingsley added two tackles and an interception.
Eastern’s next game is a big one. The Lancers go to Newington on Oct. 17 for a 6:30 p.m. game against the undefeated Nor’easters (4-0).
