Alvirne's Ethan Dudley (8) is on his way to a long gain during Friday night's 28-14 win over Manchester Central. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

HUDSON – It was an entirely different world at Alvirne High School on Friday night.

A winning one.

The parking lots were all filled as the community came out in full force for the school’s first Blackout Cancer Night. A four figure crowd spread all over the stadium, and a different vibe. That and the fact they were seeking their first win obviously inspired the Bronco football team that took it to Manchester Central right away, led 21-0 at halftime and hung on for a 28-14 season-first win.

“This game means a lot to me,” Bronco running back Mike Landmesser, who with 165 yards and a TD on 15 carries had a game more like he had a year ago when the Broncos were headed to the playoffs for the second straight year. “I hate losing. I can’t take it. I’m a competitor at heart. I need to win.”

“Man it feels great, bunch of people put in the work in the off-season, the early mornings, the late nights, here at 6 a.m.lifting,” Broncos QB Ethan Dudley said after his 122-yard rushing, 93-yard passing, three TD performance. “It just feels great. Everyone played well. Big thanks to the linemen.”

And they were, give or take, Pat Deely, Kyle Suprenant, Aidan Mulligan, Anthony Bain and Eugene Njorobe, none of whom started a year ago. On the flip side, the Broncos defensively in the first half sacked Central QB Drake Jaimes three times and pressured him several others with lineman Deely leading the way.

“The kids worked hard in practice and it’s just really rewarding to see it pay off, I’m really happy for them,” Hufft said, his team piling up 399 yards of offense. “It was a great night. And especially just for the cause…The kids were inspired.”

The team dedicated the game, in the theme of the night, to Addison Stock, a former Hudson youth cheerleader who is going through treatment.

The Broncos came right out of the shoot with a 49-yard Landmesser run on the first play from scrimmage. That set up QB Ethan Dudley’s 33-yard TD run to help give Alvirne a 7-0 lead four plays and less than two-minutes in.

A Dudley 39-yard run set up a Landmesser 13-yard TD four minutes later and it was 14-0. And with 3:33 left in the first half, Dudley found Jaden Taylor over the middle for a 25-yard TD and Suleiman Suleiman’s third PAT kick gave the home team a 21-0 lead at halftime. Incredible.

“They were a lot better football team tonight than we were,” Central coach Ryan Ray said, his team falling to 2-3. “An 0-4 football team coached by Justin Hufft was going to come out spitting dirt, throwing rocks, punching us in the face. They played a lot better football tonight than we did.

“I expected a tremendous game from Alvirne. I expected them 100 percent to show up and play great football.”

They did that, especially in the first half.

The second half? Not so much.

“They certainly battled back in the second half,” Hufft said. “We caught them early and were able to hang on. I told them ‘You guys better not stop fighting, we’re playing this game for Addie.”

Alvirne’s Patrick Deely celebrates a sack during the Broncos’ 28-14 win over Manchester Central Friday night in Hudson. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

Central did finally get untracked, getting on the board with a Jaimes 6-yard TD run and Trevor Gray 2-point conversion to make it 21-8 with 1:54 left in the third quarter. Later, after a 10 play drive failed with a high throw in the end zone, the Broncos gave the Little Green a gift with a fumbled snap scooped up by Gray and run in 17 yards for the score. The PAT kick failed and was 21-14 with 5:29 left.

However, the play that typified the night was a 43-yard Dudley run where he looked stopped and then a huge scrum formed, a mass of bodies kept moving for an incredible eight seconds and he just broke out of it into the clear. The next play he ran it in for a 1-yard run with 48 seconds left to help account for the final.

“Most fun I’ve had playing football,” Dudley said.