West Boylston Ends Lee's Run in State's Final Four
HOLYOKE, Mass. – Dominick Renzoni rushed for 302 yards and four touchdowns Friday to lead second-seeded West Boylston to a 42-22 win over Lee in the semi-finals of the Division 8 State Tournament.
The combination of Renzoni and Tommy Wyatt (139 yards, one touchdown) proved to be an unstoppable force, even for a Wildcat team that held opponents to 7.6 points per game in winning its first 10 games of the year.
“It’s a tough offense to stop,” Lee coach Tom Salinetti said. “They executed it well. We tried to get underneath it and tried to submarine it and try to seal up the gaps. They got a couple on us. They executed very well.”
West Boylston (9-2) moves on to Gillette Stadium to face the winner of Saturday’s semi-final between No. 1 Nashoba Valley Tech and No. 4 Randolph.
Friday’s Final Four matchup started with the teams trading scores.
Renzoni threw the first haymaker with a 54-yard run around the edge to find the end zone and give the Lions a 6-0 lead midway through the first quarter. Cason Orciani’s kick made it 7-0.
Lee (10-1) then got a 31-yard kickoff return from Matt Mairo and went from its 48 to a score in a drive that ate up 5 minutes, 44 seconds and ended with a 1-yard run by Dawson Reber (49 yards) on the first play of the second quarter. Jaydee Reber’s two-point run gave Lee an 8-7 lead.
West Boylston answered right away with a three-play drive keyed by a 51-yard by Renzoni and capped by an 8-yard run up the middle by Wyatt to retake the lead, 15-8.
The Lions then forced a punt and went 86 yards in 10-plays – all on the ground – to push its margin to 21-8 with 1:25 left in the half.
After a short kickoff gave Lee possession at its 47, the Wildcats attempted three passes, but a sack for 11 yards put them behind the chains, and they were forced to punt the ball back to West Boylston.
The Lions got the ball at their 14 with 14 seconds left in the half, but Renzoni broke off a 74-yard run on the second play from scrimmage to score his team’s fourth TD with no time on the clock. And Lee, in the blink of an eye, was looking at a 28-8 deficit in the locker room.
“That felt like [a back-breaker], a little bit, for sure,” Salinetti said. “But I really liked the way our guys responded. They came out in the second half, and we strung together some drives. I was really impressed with the way we battled.”
Lee took the second-half kickoff and went 59 yards, scoring on a 2-yard Dawson Reber run. The two-point conversion failed, but the Wildcats made it a two-score game at 28-14, midway through the third.
West Boylston had the answer, going 77 yards on its ensuing possession, the last 41 on a Renzoni run to the right. Orciani’s kick made it 35-14.
Lee got some success in the passing game on its next possession, driving from its 40 to the plus-27. A 5-yard penalty pushed the ball back to the 32 on fourth-and-18, and David Kirchner’s pass to Matt Mairo was stopped for a 17-yard gain, giving the ball back to West Boylston with 8:36 on the clock.
Kirchner was 6-for-7 for 52 yards through the air in that drive and 10-for-16 for 95 yards with a touchdown in the game.
The Lions’ next possession ended when Bryce Hoff chased down Wyatt from behind and forced a fumble at the end of a 39-yard run for the game’s first turnover with 5:06 on the clock.
But two plays later, on second-and-10 from the 6, Kirchner’s pass was picked off, and West Boylston DB Luke Lewis took the ball to the end zone to make it 41-14 with 4:55 left.
Lee’s final drive of the season went 65 yards, including a 21-yard run by Kirchner and a 20-yard TD pass to Gabe Ranzoni with 2:44 left to play. Kirchner’s two-point run capped the scoring.
When it was over, Salinetti was reluctant to talk about his team’s many accomplishments, choosing instead to talk about the relationships they forged in the process.
“Happy to be together – that’s what we were all about,” he said. “We’re just grateful that we’re still together right now. I just told them that just because this is our last game, that doesn’t mean that we stop being a family.”