Portsmouth comes from behind for Thanksgiving Day victory

Patriots overcome sloppy first half against Islanders

By Jim McGaw
Posted 11/23/17

The Patriots probably played their worst first half of the season but shook off their mistakes to overcome Middletown in the 53rd annual Thanksgiving Day game, 27-16.

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Portsmouth comes from behind for Thanksgiving Day victory

Patriots overcome sloppy first half against Islanders

Posted

PORTSMOUTH — The Patriots probably played their worst first half of the season but shook off their mistakes to overcome Middletown in the 53rd annual Thanksgiving Day game, 27-16.

The game couldn’t have gotten off to a better start for Portsmouth, as Brian Hamilton caught the opening kickoff and made a few nifty cuts before running down the left sideline untouched for a 92-yard touchdown. With the extra point, the home team had a 7-0 lead only 15 seconds into the game.

The Islanders went three and out on their first possession, but Portsmouth made its first miscue when quarterback Kyle Bicho’s pass was picked off by Tyrese O’Loughlin, who then switched back to quarterback. A few plays later, Middletown’s Benjamin Brower ran it in from 10 yards out. The extra-point attempt was no good, making it 7-6 with 2:27 left in the quarter

Bicho would extend Portsmouth’s lead when he kept the ball for a 3-yard touchdown run. The extra-point attempt was blocked, making it 13-6 as the first quarter ended. 

Middletown answered right back, however, with Tyron Francis Jr. running the ball into the end zone on fourth down at the 8-yard line. The point-after was good, tying the game at 13 with 7:35 left in the half.

That’s when the half took a turn for the worse for the home team, with the Islanders recovering a Patriots fumble and Bicho throwing a couple more picks. The Patriots were also plagued by some costly pass interference calls, the last of which allowed the Islanders to go ahead 16-13 after kicking a field goal just before halftime.

Second half a different story

Portsmouth played much better in the second half, however, and the team’s defense completely shut Middletown down. 

After a scoreless third quarter, a 37-yard pass play from Bicho to Hamilton put the Patriots back up, 20-16, with 6:27 left in the game.

Bicho put an exclamation point on the win when he kept the ball and ran 63 yards down the left sideline and into the end zone. A successful extra-point attempt put the Patriots up 27-16 with 2:35 left, and that was the ball game.

Patriots head coach Ryan Moniz, trying to make sense of his team’s first-half woes, said the opening kickoff return may have actually had an adverse effect on his players.

“We let our guard down and you can’t do that against a team like Middletown; they’re far too good,” he said. “It was complacency on our part. Middletown outplayed us.”

Field position was a problem throughout the first half, with the Patriots plagued by turnovers and some unfortunate penalties in the first half, he said.

“They’re very difficult to defend, and then if you turn the ball over four times in the half, it makes it that much more difficult. They lived on our side of the 50 pretty much the entire first half. In my opinion, we were fortunate to have only been down 3,” Mr. Moniz said. “It could not have gone any worse for us, but to our kids’ credit they’ve done a really good job of handling adversity on the field. In the second half we played great.”

Bicho certainly turned his game around. After a few overthrows and a few interceptions in the first half, he went 9-for-9 in the second.

“He has a track record where we can trust him,” Mr. Moniz said of his quarterback. “He has made so many plays for us throughout the year. He had a couple of miscues, but the positives for him significantly outweigh the negative.”

Super Bowl next up

The Patriots will play their biggest game of the year on Saturday, when it faces Cranston East in the Division-I championship game. The matchup to determine the best public high school football team in Rhode Island starts at 4 p.m. on Saturday, Dec. 2, at Cranston Stadium.

“We can’t have another bad half of football like this,” Mr. Moniz said. “Hopefully it’s out of our system, and I think it is.”

Portsmouth High School, PHS football

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Jim McGaw

A lifelong Portsmouth resident, Jim graduated from Portsmouth High School in 1982 and earned a journalism degree from the University of Rhode Island in 1986. He's worked two different stints at East Bay Newspapers, for a total of 18 years with the company so far. When not running all over town bringing you the news from Portsmouth, Jim listens to lots and lots and lots of music, watches obscure silent films from the '20s and usually has three books going at once. He also loves to cook crazy New Orleans dishes for his wife of 25 years, Michelle, and their two sons, Jake and Max.