It wasn’t an Atlanta Falcons-level collapse. But it was close.
After opening up a 21-0 lead late in the second quarter, the Concord High football team was simply outplayed in all facets in the second half against Windham on Friday, as the Jaguars stormed back for a 30-21 win. The loss snapped Concord’s five-game winning streak with one game left to play in the regular season.
Eli Bahuma stole the show in the first half like he’s done most of the year for Concord, rushing for three touchdowns. The first two came from inside the 10-yard line, and the third was a 37-yard run to put the Tide up three scores headed into halftime with all of the momentum. Throughout the entire half, Bahuma continually weaved through the Windham defense, proving to be a challenge to bring to the ground on first contact.
Windham (6-2) started the third quarter with the ball and converted on a fourth-and-2 from its own 28 before quarterback Josh Sweeney found David Croteau for a 45-yard completion to set the Jaguars up inside the red zone. On the next play, Sweeney lofted a pass to Bryan Desmarais in the back left corner of the end zone. Through double coverage and a pass interference penalty on Concord (5-2), Desmarais still made the catch to get Windham on the board.
Concord recovered the Jaguars’ subsequent onside kick, but the Tide’s drive stalled because of four penalties in a row.
On the next possession, Windham punched it in again on a one-yard run from Tiger An to make it a one-score game.
The Jaguars’second onside kick attempt worked and led to another scoring drive, punctuated by another TD run from An. Windham went for two and converted to take a 22-21 lead.
After Concord failed to score, Windham added its fourth TD of the half and a two-point conversion to dash any hopes Concord had of making a comeback with 2:27 left.
“I thought we just couldn’t get our rhythm going offensively. It seemed like we’d have a big play, and it’d get called back, or we’d start doing some good things, and we’d make a mistake or we’d have a busted play,” Concord head coach Jim Corkum said. “Defensively, too, we shut them out in the first half, and then we just couldn’t get that key stop when we needed to.
“Give them credit. They made plays when they needed to.”
Windham’s go-to on offense was the option play. And with a number of different counters and misdirections, Corkum’s defense just couldn’t stop Sweeney and An from running downhill.
“They did a much better job in the second half blocking on the edge,” Corkum said of what the biggest difference in Windham’s offense was from the first half to the second. “They spread us out a little bit more, and their receivers did a pretty good job blocking our guys.
“Stopping the option is all about assignment. I’m sure, when I look at the film, I’ll probably see that we had some breakdowns and (we were) not able to get off blocks and make the stop when we needed to.”
Friday’s game took Concord into uncharted waters – the Tide had won all five of its games by multiple scores, so this was a different animal against a strong Windham team. Corkum knew the two squads were pretty evenly matched, just based on having watched film and the fact that both had similar outcomes against the same opponents.
But the difference, in his view, was experience playing under pressure.
“They know what it’s like to be in a tight game,” he said of Windham. “We have not quite been there, and I think maybe that did work to a bit to our detriment tonight. I’m hoping we can take this, so that when we get into next week or playoff time, and we’re in a tight game, we don’t have the same results, that we’re able to say, ‘OK, we’ve been here before,’ and hopefully we can come out on the other end.
“Tonight’s all about using this as a growing experience and just getting better as a team.”