Marc Thaler's First and 10: Secondary to none

THERE'S BEEN considerable talk lately about the alarming lack of defense played by some title-contending high school football teams in Division I.

Those conversations don't include Derry's Pinkerton Academy, particularly after this past weekend.

Stellar pass defense paced the Astros -- surprisingly still No. 5 in the Union Leader/WGAM/WMUR Power Poll -- to Saturday's 41-21 win at defending champion-turned-bubble team Nashua South.

Pinkerton's secondary was simply first-rate.

"What I'm proud of ... is that (South) could not pass the ball on us effectively," Pinkerton head coach Brian O'Reilly said. "We adjusted our defense from last year's championship game. They had no answer on a continuous basis for throwing the ball against us, as opposed to last November when they went up and down the field on us."

Save for a late 49-yard touchdown pass, South's talented junior signal caller, Keith Farkas, was stifled. He completed 6 of 21 passes for 63 yards.

As a sophomore, he threw 21 passes in South's 33-32 overtime title win. But he tallied 17 completions to five receivers for 253 yards.

Five players fueled Pinkerton's plan to prevent South's passing attack from doing damage: Luke Somers (interception), Brett Liporto, (interception, fumble recovery), Cam Cote, and brothers Corey and Lavontae Beck.

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The defense tallied three of Pinkerton's four takeaways.

"We were able to pattern-read them. We were able to take away what they do best. We worked very, very hard on it," O'Reilly said. "We learned from our mistakes last year in the championship game.

"(Farkas) did have a great game against us. But there were people wide open in that game," he added. "Other than that (49-yard TD) pass at the end, there was nobody wide open. We had everything covered. And we were looking to pick off passes."

This is also true: Swiss cheese defense doesn't exist in Derry.

Digging a hole

No. 1 Bishop Guertin of Nashua (8-0, 6-0 Div. II) had to come from behind for the first time this season. The Cards, 42-19 winners over Keene, needed to erase a 6-0 deficit.

BG's streak of consecutive quarters without trailing ended at 28.

Sky high

It's an understatement to say No. 4 Nashua North (7-1, 6-1 Div. I) is having trouble making stops. But, the Titans made the one that counted most in their 49-48 overtime win over Londonderry (4-4, 4-3). It enabled them to clinch the program's first playoff berth.

"We made one good call the whole night," said North head coach Jason Robie, whose team has surrendered 151 points in its last three games. "That was the extra-point block."

The play is called "skywalker." It calls for 6-foot 4-inch linemen Zach Hunnewell and James Murphy to provide a solid push up front. That gives the team's best vertical jumpers -- Trevor Rancourt, Anton Marinchik and Dylan Brodeur -- space to launch.

Rancourt blocked the PAT. It was the difference.

Unforeseen upsets

Fighting for a playoff berth, Goffstown (3-5, 3-4 Div. III) and Merrimack Valley of Penacook (4-4, 3-4 Div. IV) stumbled unexpectedly in Week 8.

Goffstown lost its muddy Saturday matchup, 8-0, at Pembroke (2-6, 2-5). MV lost on Friday, 14-6, at Monadnock of Swanzey (3-5, 2-5).

Luckily for Goffstown and MV, both are still alive in the postseason push.

Curse of Campbell?

Looks like Campbell of Litchfield (5-3, 5-2 Div. VI) may thwart the title hopes of Newport (4-4, 4-3) for the second straight season.

In a fight for fourth place, the Cougars beat the Tigers, 27-0, on Sunday. Last year, the Cougars topped the Tigers in the semifinals, 14-0.

Marc Thaler covers high school football for the New Hampshire Union Leader & New Hampshire Sunday News. Read his blog "Moving the Chains" and e-mail him at mthaler@unionleader.com.