Update: Colonels vs. Bears Postponed Until Saturday

Note: Due to impending thunderstorms, tonight's game with Stonington has been postponed until tomorrow, Saturday, at 1 p.m. at Mignault Field.

On this Homecoming Weekend in Colonel country, the Ledyard High School football team will face the 3-1 Stonington Bears Saturday at Mignault Field in what is expected to be a hard-fought and exciting game.

One thing – the home field is still without bleachers, so feel free to bring your own chairs.

“Stonington is an extremely good football team,” said Ledyard coach Jim Bounocore. “They’re 3-1, and quite frankly they’re a play away from being 4-0. They have some very talented kids at skill positions and their line is big and strong. What they do on offense they do very well.”

Ledyard, 2-1, is coming off its first loss at the hands of 6th-ranked New London, a game in which the Whalers ran up 26 points in the second quarter en route to a 33-17 win.

Buonocore said New London’s speed was the difference in that game.

“We played a pretty good football game for three of the four quarters,” he said. “Unfortunately, a football game is four quarters long, and that second quarter really was our downfall. We got hit quickly with a barrage of points.”

Live and learn, he said.

“There are a lot of positives to pull from that, a lot of things that we can learn about ourselves, and things I think we did learn about ourselves. We wanted to pull those positives out during the course of this week and hopefully see a good result at the end of 48 minutes on Friday night.”

After dropping its opener to Waterford – a heart-breaking 33-28 loss that was decided on the final play – Stonington has won three straight, including a 41-0 blow-out of St. Bernard in week 2. The Bears’ running game is particularly troublesome for opponents, and the challenge for Ledyard will be to contain star running back Harry Calmar, who rushed for 142 yards last week in a win over Killingly.

“We certainly feel we have our work cut out for us,” Buonocore said. “Stonington's a very good football team. But really our focus is on us. Play well on offense, defense and special teams, pay attention to detail, play physical and fundamentally sound football and we should give ourselves a chance to win.”

The Colonel's will be trying to avoid a repeat of last year's Homecoming game in which Ledyard was shocked by Waterford – the Lancer's first win over the Colonels in 15 years.

As mentioned, the bleachers are not yet ready – the school is still hoping they will be ready for Montville on Oct. 28. But Buonocore, who also serves as Ledyard High’s Athletic Director, said not to worry.

“Certainly the venue is a beautiful one in that people will still have great access and views from the surrounding hillside. They can bring their own chairs. It will be similar to the Windham game a couple of weeks ago,” he said.

Except more people, he added.

“We’re expecting a much larger crowd for this game, at least from the Stonington side. It is homecoming weekend here. But we also feel that the way our venue is set up it’s going to be a great night for our fans.”