PENACOOK – The Merrimack Valley football team hosted a Kingswood Knights program desperate for a win to keep their playoff hopes alive. Unfortunately for the Pride, that’s exactly what happened.

MV played well defensively and the special teams units came up with some big plays to take a 10-6 halftime lead, but Pride struggled to move the chains and the Knight’s run game, led by senior quarterback Garrett Burke (145 yards on 27 carries, three touchdowns) and senior running back Tyrese Ryder (132 yards on 17 carries), wore MV down in the second half to grind out a 20-17 victory on Friday night.

Both teams are now 2-4.

“That’s a good football team,” MV head coach Matt Shaw said of Kingswood, noting that two of the Knights’ losses have been close games against Plymouth (6-0) and Trinity (5-1). “To look at their record does not do them justice. They’re a tough, physical football team.”

The Pride returned the opening kickoff 30 yards, but fumbled it on their own 46 and Kingswood took advantage of the opportunity. Burke ran the ball 32 yards to the end zone to put the Knights up 6-0 just 2:05 into the game.

MV caught a break on the next series. The normally strong Pride running game was stymied all night by Kingswood defense. A 23-yard pass from junior quarterback Jack Parris (6-for-11, 91 passing yards) to senior Reece Clermont picked up an MV first down, but all of the running plays were stopped for no gain or negative yards. Senior kicker/punter Travis Garcia booted the ball 50 yards, Kingswood muffed the return, and MV junior Chris Babonis pounced on the ball on the Kingswood 4 yard line. Four plays later Parris had a 6-yard TD run and Garcia’s extra point gave the Pride a 7-6 lead with 4:45 left in the first quarter.

Garcia, whose five punts were average of 47.2 yards (his longest was 52), put the Knights back on their 4 again with a 48 yard boot. Two plays later, senior defensive end Aiden Paquette forced a fumble and MV recovered on the 15, setting up a 33-yard field goal from Garcia at 8:26 in the second quarter, sending the Pride into halftime with a 10-6 lead.

Burke and Ryder led the Knights on a 10-play, 64-yard drive that ended with a 3-yard TD run by Burke and ate up over five minutes to open the second half. The pair also led a 13-play, 84-yard drive that ate up over nine minutes of the fourth quarter, resulting in a 21-yard scoring run from Burke and a 20-10 Kingswood lead with 2:42 left in the game.

In between those drives, the Pride got nowhere on the ground. Kingswood ran the ball 51 times for 301 yards, while MV only managed 27 yards on 20 carries. Only seven of those carries were for positive yards. Senior Colby Scheffer (23 yards on nine carries) was the most efficient Pride rusher.

Devin Perkins (three tackles for loss), Ryder (two tackles for loss) and Jacob Brown (tackle for loss and a sack) led Kingswood’s defense. Senior defensive end Mike Heine had a sack and a pair of tackles for loss for the Pride.

“You don’t hit an open man, ok, you try to get  the ball outside. You try to run up the middle. There’s only so many options on the table,” Shaw said, describing his offense’s frustration with the Kingswood defense. “Then you try to get creative and call plays from the back of the playbook. All of a sudden the creative play doesn’t work out the way it does on paper.”

The one bright spot on offense was a 55-yard touchdown pass from Parris to Babonis that cut MV’s deficit to 20-17 with 2:19 left in the game. Babonis made the catch for about 10 yards, cut back inside to beat a defender and then turned on the afterburners to the outside corner of the end zone.

Garcia’s powerful kick would’ve given MV a chance to at least force overtime, but the Pride never got that chance. Burke ran the ball four times, putting his head down and tucking in behind his line every time, to get the first down and then took a knee to run out the clock.

“Earlier in the year I think we would have immediately dropped our chances and left ourselves out of it,” Shaw said. “But tonight, we fought to the end.”

Playoff picture

The victory was a season-saving one for Kingswood, while MV is still in playoff contention, although its path is now much more challenging to get there.

Eight teams in Division II make the playoffs, with Plymouth, Souhegan and Pelham all currently at 6-0 and likely to get the stop three spots.

Trinity (5-1), John Stark (4-2), Manchester West (4-2) and Bow (3-3) are currently in the Nos. 4-7 spots. 

Six 2-4 teams – MV (4.6667 rating), Kennett (4.6667), St. Thomas (4.3333), Hanover (4.3333), Kingswood (4.000) and ConVal (4.0000) – are fighting for the eighth and final playoff spot. Team’s ratings (the number of points earned based on the strength of a team’s victories, divided by the number of games played) are what determines playoff seedings, not records. With six teams battling for one spot and only three weeks remaining in the regular season, it’s likely to come down to strength of schedule to determine who gets that last spot.

MV next plays at ConVal on Friday night, travels to Plymouth on Oct. 26 and hosts Pembroke (1-5) in the annual Cloe-O’Brien Bowl rivalry game on Nov. 1.