Groton - It wasn't until very late that the Waterford High School sideline could exhale Friday night. Even then, they left Dorr Field understanding the game's difficulty.

But then, the scoreboard always trumps style points.

And the Lancers, left for dead a few weeks back after a barfbag special against Bacon Academy, have officially won three straight, giving themselves a season after all.

Chase Speller ran for 209 yards, Isaiah Jones scored twice and Corey Lentz intercepted two passes, leading Waterford to a 23-7 win over Fitch.

The Lancers (4-6) await their annual Thanksgiving Day game now against neighboring rival East Lyme.

"It wasn't as easy as I wanted it to be and I don't think we executed the way we wanted to," Waterford coach Mike Ellis said. "Give Fitch a lot of credit. But then you've got to give our kids some credit because they did overcome it at the end."

Speller's 37-yard touchdown run with three minutes remaining finally sealed it.

"We were struggling a little on offense, but ended up getting it together at the end," Speller said, unwittingly giving a pretty good summary of his team's season: struggling for a while, but finally getting it together at the end.

"I guess we have a different mentality," Speller said. "We were tired of losing."

Jones, who scored on a 22-yard run and 9-yard touchdown reception, said, "We came together as a team and we've been executing coach's game plan. We decided to play strong together and not to give up on each other."

Waterford led 14-7 at halftime and well into the fourth period, holding Fitch's offense to a few crumbs in the second half. Lentz's interception and sacks from Noah Concasia and Cody Cleary thwarted drives. Still, the Falcons (0-9) had the ball down seven at their own 19-yard line with 3:38 left.

Fitch lost all 19 yards. A bad snap led to a safety, giving Waterford a 16-7 lead.

Waterford's Jake Mangual, who splits time at quarterback with Spencer Hoagland, ran 11 times for 56 yards, completed six of 10 passes for 41 yards and caught two passes for 15 yards.

Ellis said he's planning on staying with both quarterbacks.

"When you take a look at the stats - and Jake's stats are better than Spencer's stats - but when you look at the points we've scored and the drives, it's pretty even," Ellis said. "Overall, it's been a good mix for them, especially running the option. They take a lot of hits and we've made sure we've had two quarterbacks ready."

Fitch cut a 14-0 deficit to 14-7 at halftime after Rob Duncan hit Luke Letellier with a 9-yard touchdown pass late in the second period.

"Watching Fitch on film in their last three games, you hear things about them and program," Ellis said. "But what you saw on film was a bunch of kids who never gave up. They had two weeks to prepare for us. We told the kids their backs were going to be against the wall and that they'd give us everything they had. I think they did that."

m.dimauro@theday.com

Twitter: @BCgenius