Can’t spell ‘team’ without CVU

A large crowd and a half-moon showed up for the state Division 1 title game in St. Johnsbury on Saturday night.

It may have been just a semicircular-lunar display on this beautiful night for football, but it was full-tilt lunacy when the final buzzer sounded.

Players, spectators and coaches erupted in a frenzied celebration as Champlain Valley won its second state title in three years, beating No. 2 Rutland 41-14. It was the Redhawks’ third participation in the state title game in four years.

Quite an achievement for a program that’s just been in existence for about 20 years.

Assistant coach Sam Fontaine has been part of the team since 2012 when he graduated from CVU. During that time he has seen teams that didn’t win a game. There were times when he thought Champlain Valley would never win a state title, but the Redhawks proved him wrong in 2022.

“Now, I stand here, and it’s happened again,” Fontaine said, surrounded by the joyous turmoil of players celebrating, reluctant to leave the field, imprinting memories they will treasure for the rest of their lives.

The heart of the team was built on players working together from early morning until late at night, day in and day out, Fontaine said.

“This group was together no matter what. They were going to succeed no matter what, and they proved it tonight,” he said. “A lot of the teams in the future will look back and say, ‘I want to be like that.’”

Katrina Frere, mother of senior wide receiver Dylan Frere, said she had expected from the beginning of the season that the Redhawks “could go all the way.”

But this team didn’t just go all the way, it went unbeaten in an unrivaled display of dominance.

“If one of them has an off game, someone else steps up. They support each other on and off the field,” Frere said. “Last year, when they lost to Burr & Burton, they started throwing the ball the next week because they didn’t want to lose again.”

No. 1 Champlain Valley 41, No. 2 Rutland 14

Against Rutland, Champlain Valley followed its modus operandi for all but one of its 2024 games by getting on the scoreboard first.

Just over four minutes after the opening kickoff, which Rutland received and was stymied after four downs, senior running Nolan Walpole caught a 5-yard pass from sophomore Orion Yates and took the ball 29 yards to put his team up 7-0.

The game started, as many games this year started, with CVU serving up a steady diet of Walpole running the ball until opponents make adjustments to stop the rushing attack, leaving the defense open for CVU’s passing game to be effective.

On its ensuing possession, Rutland made three first downs and looked to be threatening until it fumbled the ball, which CVU’s Sean Kennedy recovered on the 45-yard line.

After a pass for 15 yards to Jacob Armstrong and three rushing plays by Walpole, the Redhawks found themselves on Rutland’s 19-yard line where another pass to Armstrong led to CVU’s second score with 3:07 left in the first quarter.

At the 1:44 mark, Rutland’s Noah Bruttomesso tossed a 7-yard strike to Ethan Wideawake to make it 14-7.

However, just 20 seconds into the second quarter, Walpole answered with a 19-yard scoring reception to make the score 21-7.

With 4:45 left before intermission, junior Dylan Terricciano made a dramatic tackle on the 5-yard line to prevent Rutland from reaching pay dirt — or in the case of St. Johnsbury Academy’s beautiful Fairbanks Field — pay turf. After a time-consuming drive of almost seven minutes, Rutland had to turn over the ball on downs.

Just over five minutes into the second half, sophomore Alex Jovell kicked a 47-yard field goal to push the Redhawks’ lead to 24-7.

A little over three minutes later, Jovell added another to make it 27-7.

Less than a minute into the final quarter, Bruttomesso scored himself from 4-yards out, but that was all of the scoring for Rutland in this title game.

Frere scored on a 25-yard pass, and Yates called his own number from the 3-yard line for the game’s final 41-14 margin.

If Walpole’s running was the main course that CVU served, Rutland’s menu feature a lot of wildcat plays, but the Redhawks were rarely fooled.

“We knew that they liked the wildcat. What did surprise us a little bit was when they ran the wildcat reverse,” Fleming said. “You know, they put a little extra wrinkle on it.”

This means that often the ball was being hiked directly to senior running back Jayden Graham, but on many of these trick plays he was lateraling or handing the ball off to someone else.

But, CVU rarely took the bait and, the majority of times, its defenders shut the trickery down.

Fleming was effusive in his praise for senior Zane Martenis, playing in place of fellow senior linebacker Lucas Almena-Lee, who tore his ACL late in the previous playoff game against Middlebury.

The coaching staff was confident in Martenis’ ability to step into whatever role he was needed for.

“We’ve always known we’d be safe if we put him in,” Fleming said. “We knew he knew his assignments. Tonight, he rose above all expectation.”

Fleming also praised the performance of running back Nolan Walpole, whose name the coach is fond of abbreviating as “No Wall,” apparently because the senior running back doesn’t recognize any defensive wall. Throughout the year, Walpole has habitually run through defensive lines where there is no seam, but he has also run to the outside, displaying a deceptive speed when he finds himself in the open field.

Although his coaching staff called a brilliant game, Fleming said, he didn’t think it was strategy or tactics that won the football game for CVU.

Patiently consenting to one more interview after all the well-wishers, the players and other media had gone, Fleming said, “What the kids had was that shared spirit, the unity that comes with it, and the determination to do well, not just for themselves, but for one another.”

Before heading into the dark, as the field lights were turned off, the last of the trash was emptied by workers and the 2024 season was put to bed, he added: “I think we saw that happen all season long, and particularly tonight.”

CVU 21, Middlebury 7

Middlebury Union came to Hinesburg to face Champlain Valley Union in the second round of the state Division 1 football playoffs on Saturday, Nov. 2.

Maybe it was a Halloween lag because, although this game came two days after Oct. 31, it was by far the scariest contest the Redhawks have faced this year. CVU, which had scored early and often in its previous games this season, didn’t get on the scoreboard until midway through the second quarter in this contest.

Finally, at the 7:57 mark in the second quarter, Yates lofted a long pass to Frere, who had gotten past the Tigers’ secondary and scampered home for a 7-0 lead.

The scares didn’t stop there. However, in the end, CVU prevailed 21-7, a close-shave win in a season when the Redhawks had won by big margins and shut-down defense. The win over Middlebury put CVU in the Division 1 state title game.

Just 13 seconds into the second half against Middlebury, things got really hair-raising when, like the haunted house performer who springs out of a closet with an axe, a Yates pass was blocked at the line, springing straight up in the air.

The spectators gave a gasp at this shocking development and, when the ball came down, an audible moan, as the Tigers’ Tucker Morter grabbed it, racing 35-yards to make the score 7-7.

The score stayed stuck at 7-all, through the rest of the third quarter and most of the fourth. With just over four minutes left in the game, Frere took a Yates pass on a 69-yard rumble and his second touchdown of the night.

A minute later, senior George Taylor put a cherry on the win, with a 69-yard scoring reception of his own.

After the game Yates talked about how Taylor had called his own number on CVU’s final score, convincing the quarterback that his defender was playing him too tight.

“I look over at George. He’s like, ‘Do it.’ And I’m like, ‘Oh, that doesn’t look good.’ He’s like, ‘Yes, do it.’ I’m like, ‘All right, fine,’” Yates recounted enthusiastically after the game. “He called his shot.”

Taylor’s score made it 21-7, a lead which stood up for the game’s final three and half minutes.

The game was a “wake-up call and a gut check” coach Rahn Fleming said. He told his players, “Now, we know what we are all the way to our core. We’re scrappers. We know what it is to win by a whole bunch. Now, we know what it is to be in a dog fight. We can win dog fights.”

The game reminded Fleming of the Burr and Burton game last year when the Bulldogs knocked the Redhawks out of the semifinals 34-27.

That game had turned on the Bulldogs capitalizing on the Redhawks’ greatest strength, which was their aggressive defense. CVU must have learned its lesson because, against the Tigers, it was the Redhawks who capitalized on Middlebury’s aggressive defense by finding open receivers whose defenders were playing too close, playing to stop the run.

“They were attacking aggressively, very aggressively, all game long on defense. A couple of times they attacked, and we found open field behind them, and Orion had just enough time and just enough presence of mind,” Fleming said. “There’s an epic feeling to it when your greatest strength becomes your greatest weakness.”

The Redhawks were able to win this gut-check game because they played together, he said.