Week 3 Football: Jameson Dion, Amherst thump Holyoke, stay undefeated (PHOTOS)
Published: 09-21-2023 11:15 PM |
HOLYOKE — From the opening coin toss, Amherst was the more aggressive team on Thursday night. The Hurricanes elected to receive and put the ball in star running back Jameson Dion’s hands as early as they could. Four plays into the game, Dion ripped off a 55-yard touchdown run to open the flood gates.
Amherst scored 32 points in the first quarter, and Dion finished with 318 yards on 16 carries (three touchdowns) en route to a 54-8 victory over Holyoke at the Roberts Field Sports Complex.
The Hurricanes have now won their first three games by an average margin of 49 points and have eclipsed at least 50 points in all three. But head coach Vinnie Guiel has his eyes set on the road ahead – a matchup with Wahconah next Thursday in Week 4.
“[We’re] 3-0, on to Wahconah,” Guiel said. “Obviously, it gets a little harder from here, so we’ll see what the future brings. I’m proud of the guys, Holyoke played tough so hats off to them. That’s it. Time for league play. I thought we looked good tonight, but we’ll really find out in a week. Our eyes are on Wahconah. I’ve been thinking about this game for a long time.”
Holyoke couldn’t overcome a handful of miscues on both sides of the ball.
“No matter the score, you keep playing as hard as you can,” Purple Knights head coach David Guzman said. “We did that, but we didn’t play well. We made a ton of mistakes, we missed assignments, we missed throws, we missed catches. About everything negative that could happen to a team happened to us tonight. It’s part of the game, and I’ll continue to coach my guys hard and they’ll continue to play hard.”
As Amherst has done in every game, it once again used the double wing to perfection. The Hurricanes gained 415 yards on the ground, highlighted by Dion’s 318 and Matthew Hockman’s 10 rushes for 71 yards and two touchdowns. Hockman also grabbed an interception and returned it for a touchdown on Holyoke’s first play from scrimmage to break the score open 16-0 in the early going.
Guzman acknowledged the Hurricanes’ terrific running game, and especially gave credit to Dion for the work he’s put in to become the weapon he is.
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“He’s a fantastic player,” Guzman said of Dion. “He’s as good as there is around here. He is fantastic. And when I saw him on film, I said, ‘Holy s***, this kid can run.’ He is strong, he is fast, he is elusive, and he shakes people. That’s about as good as you can get. You can tell that that kid put the work in during the off-season, and it’s paying dividends right now.”
Junior Ramsey added the other first-half Amherst touchdown to go along with Hockman’s three and Dion’s two. The six scores and five two-point conversions brought the score to 46-0 at halftime.
On the opening kickoff in the second half, Holyoke’s Avanteay Rivera fielded the kick on a hop at his own 10-yard line, and ran into a host of Hurricane defenders around the 30. Rivera broke out of the pile and took off with only the kicker to beat. After making him miss, he dashed into the end zone to get the Purple Knights on the board.
Special teams has been the only area that Amherst can really nit-pick in, as the Hurricanes have had trouble giving up big returns. Rivera had several returns out near midfield, and eventually broke off the 90-yarder.
“That special teams touchdown, we had the guy wrapped up,” Guiel said. “We just gotta finish that tackle. Special teams hasn’t been great, but we’ve gotten better over the weeks.”
As for Holyoke, that phase of the game is a strong one. Guzman likes the effort his special teams group has put in over the first three weeks, and hopes it translates to the other units.
“Our special teams has been really good all year,” Guzman said. “That’s a positive. We hope to build on that positivity. Hopefully that can transfer to the offensive side of the ball because we just haven’t been a good offensive football team.”
Dion got his first taste of second-half action during the 2023 season on Thursday night. He played only the first half of Amherst’s first two games this season before resting on the sideline given the big leads. Fittingly, he took his only carry after intermission on Thursday 53 yards for a touchdown.
“We come out and kickoff, and they house it,” Guiel said. “We put him back in just to make sure, and he scored on the first play. He was done after that.”
Four of the Purple Knights’ five offensive linemen are brand new to varsity football. And as the old adage goes, football is won or lost between the tackles up front. Holyoke is hoping to get its o-line some valuable experience this season. Gifting four turnovers to an already powerful offense and being outmatched up front was exactly what the Purple Knights dealt with against Amherst.
“We have a really young offensive line,” Guzman said. “We start two freshmen and two sophomores, and we only have one guy that has varsity experience on the o-line. Football is a game that’s won by turnovers, and a game that’s won in the trenches. We’re just struggling with age, but the kids are getting better. I see improvement, so I hope to build on that.”
Holyoke’s (0-3) schedule doesn’t get any easier moving forward, and it starts with a tough matchup against Longmeadow next Friday at 7 pm.
Amherst (3-0) returns home against Wahconah (1-1) on Thursday at 7 p.m. in a game that should show just how good this Hurricanes team can be.