Stoneham Falls To Reading In Freezing OT Thriller

STONEHAM -- Was it having the wind at his back that led to Matt Sannella's fourth quarterback comeback? Or did he say to himself he wasn't going to wear blue and white to Thanksgiving dinner for a third straight year. Whatever the reason, Reading's senior quarterback brought his team back from a 20-6 deficit to beat Stoneham, 28-26, in overtime.

The loss was the first of the year for Stoneham (11-1), while Reading ended a two-year Thanksgiving losing streak to finish 8-3.

With less than five minutes to play it looked like Stoneham would head into its Dec. 1 Super Bowl game undefeated. After a touchdown from Seth Russell, and two from Christos Argyropoulos, the last with 4:04 to play in the fourth quarter, Stoneham was ahead 20-6.

That’s when Sannella took over, and all the struggles of the previous three quarters vanished. In the fourth quarter, Sannella was 8-for-11 passing for 125 yards and two touchdowns.

Starting at his own 43, the comeback started with Sannella hitting Domenic Masucci for 39 yards, Colin DuRoss for 9, and then Javon Nortelus for an 8-yard touchdown. Sannella ran for the conversion to make it 20-14 with 3:27 left. Stoneham went three-and-out and Sannella went back to work from his own 21. He ran for 8 yards, and completed passes of 8, 18, and 16 yards, setting up a third-and-10 from the Stoneham 17.

When the ball was hiked over Sannella’s head, it seemed Reading’s comeback had come up short. But Sannella caught up to it, turned, and fired a pass into the end zone to DuRoss for the touchdown. The unlikely score and missed conversion left it at 20-20 with 1:05 to play.

“I was thinking pick it up and just make a play,” said Fiore of the near disaster. “Sometime it happens. He made the play he needed to make. That’s a real winner there in Matt Sannella.”

In overtime, Sannella ran it in from the 5-yard line and added the conversion run as well, giving Reading a 28-20 lead. It was Stoneham’s turn and the Spartans answered quickly with Russell scoring on the first play to make it 28-26. Then it was time for the conversion.

After 40 minutes of bitter cold football, the outcome came down to a mad sprint to the pylon between Argyropoulos and the Reading defense, led by Jake D’Agostino. But D’Agostino and a host of teammates did what no one has been able to do this season, stop Argyropoulos and Stoneham.

“We’re really proud of our seniors, really proud of our program today, and really happy to go into off-season with a win,” said Reading coach John Fiore.

And Sannella is really happy to wear red and black for Thanksgiving dinner. His family is split between Reading and Stoneham (his aunt is Stoneham principal Donna Cargill) and for the past 15 years family members from the losing side had to wear the colors of the winning side to Thanksgiving dinner. That meant Sannella has been forced to wear blue the last two years.

"We never quit. I talked to the boys at halftime and said we have 20 minutes to go show people how the 2018 Rockets want to be remembered," said Sannella.

Photo by Bob Holmes