Bishop Guertin's Matt Santosuosso looks to throw a pass to teammate Connor Guibord during Friday's Division I quarterfinal against Pinkerton in Derry. The Cardinals lost to the Astros 14-12.. (Photo by Joe Marchilena/NH-HighSchoolSports.com)

DERRY – Football is different in November and no one knows that better than Brian O’Reilly.

The longtime Pinkerton Academy coach stressed that to his team leading up to Friday’s Division I quarterfinal against Bishop Guertin, and when the Astros needed to make the extra effort to come up with a big play, they did.

No. 4 Pinkerton scored twice in the first half and let the defense do the rest, as the Astros came up with a stand inside its own 5-yard line and stopped a two-point conversion to hang on for a 14-12 win over No. 5 Bishop Guertin. Pinkerton moves on to the semifinals for the first time since 2018, where it will face the winner of Saturday’s quarterfinal between No. 1 Londonderry and No. 8 Merrimack.

“We talked all week about playoff football,” O’Reilly said. “It’s always going to come down to the last play. If you’re up by three scores, or you’re down by three scores, it’s playoff football.

“You don’t stop until it’s over, and then when it’s over, if you can say to yourself, I did everything I could, you’ve got nothing to worry about. If you don’t, and you say in the third quarter, you took a play off and they wound up scoring a touchdown, that’s what playoff football is.”

Pinkerton (9-1 in Division I, 9-2 overall) made two of those plays in the fourth quarter while the defense had it’s collective back against the wall.

With Bishop Guertin (8-3) driving to get a potential-tying score, the Cardinals faced fourth-and-2 at the Astros’ 3-yard line. Quarterback Matt Santosuosso tried to pick up the first down with his legs, but the Pinkerton defense swarmed the senior and stopped him a yard short to turn the ball over on downs.

The offense couldn’t get a first down and had to punt the ball back to the Cardinals. This time, on a fourth-and-6 play, Santosuosso connected with Ronan Balistreri for a 14-yard touchdown with 4:35 to play that got Bishop Guertin within two points.

The Cardinals lined up to go for two and Santosuosso pitched to running back Charlie Bellavance, but Pinkerton’s Patrick Waldron was there to make the tackle and keep the Astros in front.

“We needed to fire off the line and attack in the backfield, and that’s what we did,” Pinkerton senior Cole Yennaco said. “Our guys did well with that.”

Despite giving up the score, Pinkerton’s defense was able to regroup quickly, realizing the lead still belonged to the Astros.

“I know once they scored, and everybody was down for a second, we refocused,” O’Reilly said. “If they don’t get two points, they are going to win the game. That sounds arrogant, but you have to have the confidence that we’re going to drive the ball and not let them have it back.”

The Cardinals had success picking up short yardage most of the night, but just couldn’t come through on those two plays.

“We were running off tackle quite a bit there, trying to run quarterback power, and then hoping at some point, they kept crashing down,” Bishop Guertin coach John Trisciani said. “Then there’s an option where the quarterback pitch it if it looks like the decision to be made. They’re flying around. They’re very physical. We just didn’t get that one.”

Matt Morrison opened the scoring for Pinkerton on an 87-yard touchdown run with 4:52 left in the first quarter. A bad snap doomed the extra point, keeping it 6-0. Morrison finished with a team-high 128 yards on 11 carries.

After forcing a Bishop Guertin punt, the Astros went 71 yards in eight plays, scoring on a 6-yard run by Yennaco (10 carries, 58 yards), and Jake Albert (13, 83) ran in the conversion to make it 14-0 with 9:29 left in the second quarter.

The Cardinals answered with a dominant drive of their own, going 80 yards on 17 plays, eating up 8:49 of the clock. Santosuosso ended the possession with a 1-yard scoring run with 40 seconds left in the half, but another bad snap on the PAT kept it 14-6 Pinkerton.

Santosuosso finished with 134 yards on 26 carries and was 4 of 5 for 28 yards in the air, while Charlie Bellavance had 19 carries for 91 yards.

“That’s a really good football team and it comes down to a couple of plays,” Trisciani said. “They hit us on a couple of long runs early. I think we were able to make the adjustment but sometimes it comes a little too late. I thought we played really good defense. The weather plays a big part in all of this. I’m just really happy with the effort, to come up here and battle for four quarters.”

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