The Tolland Eagles will venture away from home to take on the East Catholic Eagles at 7:00 p.m. on Thursday. Both teams are still undefeated (Tolland has three wins , while East Catholic has five dating back to last season).
Last Friday, Tolland narrowly escaped with a win as the squad sidled past Notre Dame Prep 17-14.
Tolland can attribute much of their success to Ryan Caminiti, who rushed for 51 yards and a touchdown, and also threw for 124 yards on 13 of 25 attempts. The dominant performance gave Caminiti a new career-high in rushing yards. Symon Snyder also made an appearance on special teams (luckily for Tolland): his a 48-yard strike wound up winning them the game.
Tolland's defense was in the mix too, especially the secondary: they snagged four passes before it was all said and done. Brayden O'Connor led the group effort, picking up two of those interceptions all by himself.
Meanwhile, even if it wasn't a dominant performance, East Catholic beat Joel Barlow 26-20 on Friday.
A big part of East Catholic's victory came down to the chemistry between Christian Morales and his top target Joey Montalvo. Morales threw for 211 yards and two touchdowns on only 19 passes while Montalvo picked up 183 receiving yards and two touchdowns. Montalvo's receiving production has been exceptional recently as that marked his third straight game with at least 104 receiving yards dating back to last season.
Tolland's record now sits at 3-0. As for East Catholic, their record now sits at 3-0.
Thursday's match might be decided in the trenches. Tolland has been excellent on the ground this season, having averaged 167.3 rushing yards per game. It's a different story for East Catholic, though, as they've been averaging only 72. How will they fare against such a dominant running game?
Everything went Tolland's way against East Catholic in their previous matchup back in September of 2023, as Tolland made off with a 20-0 win. The rematch might be a little tougher for Tolland since the team won't have the home-field advantage this time around. We'll see if the change in venue makes a difference.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
