Wayland football clinches DCL Small title with blowout win over Newton South

NEWTON — Coming into Saturday afternoon's game against Newton South, the Wayland football team has leaned largely on senior running back Shayne Sutton. 

Sutton has rushed for 664 rushing yards on 98 carries and 12 touchdowns through six games following the Warriors dominating 39-7 victory over the Lions as Wayland clinched the Dual County League Small title. 

He credits his work in the offseason and in the weight room for his success.

"My line, working hard in practice and all my summer work too," Sutton said. "I attribute that to my success on the field."

"He is also just a gross athlete," teammate and quarterback Adam Goodfellow said. 

"He is probably one of the strongest guys on the team," Sebastian Luciano added. 

He then deflected all the praise from his teammates back onto them. 

"We couldn't have done any of that without each other," Sutton said. 

On Saturday, Sutton rushed for 31 yards on 11 carries because he only played a half as the Warriors took a commanding 39-0 lead into halftime. 

"They had some big boys up front so they were hard to move," Wayland head coach Scott Parseghian said. 

Still, Sutton was able to get the necessary push and yards when needed.

After an interception by Goodfellow on a half-back pass on the first drive of the game, the Warriors (4-2, 3-0 DCL) faced a fourth-and-3 at the Newton South 38-yard line. Sutton was able to get exactly the three yards needed to get the first down.

"He got that fourth down run that kept the drive going leading to our first touchdown," Parseghian said. "That was a big fourth down play, when you got a guy that you rely on, you can go for it on fourth down near midfield.

"To get that push and to get that first down was huge." 

On the next drive, Sutton took it himself from six yards out to give the Warriors a 12-0 lead after one quarter of play. 

"He's a powerful runner and he's a tough guy," Parseghian said. "He's scored a lot of touchdowns and has done a good job for us." 

While Sutton didn't quite get the production he has been used to getting this season, Goodfellow carried the load both through the air and on the ground. 

Goodfellow scored five total touchdowns (3 rushing, 2 passing) through just over a half of play.

"With how well Adam runs it's almost like we have two running backs out there," Parseghian said. "He was a receiver for us first last year and we move him to quarterback this year. We just wanted to have our best athlete at quarterback and that's what we did and he's been having a great year for us.

"If teams focus on stopping Shayne, then Adam is going to take over," Parseghian said. "If they focus on Adam, then Shayne is going to have a good day."  

Goodfellow ran for a total of 74 yards on five carries including a 49-yard, a 6-yard and a 2-yard touchdown runs. He also threw touchdown passes to wide receiver Finn O'Driscoll for 15 and 34 yards and threw for a total of 146 yards on 7-for-10 passing.

"We would always go to the field across the street from my house and play catch," Goodfellow said on his chemistry with O'Driscoll. "Every practice I throw it to him about 50 times. I just kind of chuck it up when I know that he is going to get under it."

Many of Goodfellow's rushes came on read option plays that he kept himself that ended up going for big gains. 

"We knew that their defensive ends rushed heavy," Goodfellow said. "So I just kept the ball and the blocking was phenomenal and everything just went to plan." 

Ethan Winter is a senior multimedia sports journalist at the Daily News. He can be reached at ewinter@wickedlocal.com. Follow him on Twitter @EWints.