New London — The first time New London touched the football, disaster struck.

The third-seeded Whalers fumbled away the opening kickoff in Tuesday's CIAC Class L football quarterfinal at Cannamela Field. No. 6 Notre Dame of West Haven quickly cashed in with a touchdown.

It was a sign of bad things to come.

New London stumbled and bumbled its way through the rain and wind to a 44-7 loss. The Whalers were clearly overmatched, committed five turnovers and didn't register a first down until inside of the final three minutes.

"It did (snowball)," New London coach Juan Roman said. "But you know? You reap what you sow. Because lying is a sin I'm not going to sit here and say, 'We did everything right and we deserve to win.'

"Sometimes you don't deserve to win. I know people might not like hearing that. It might not be fashionable. ... If we're going to be the team our town wants us to be, we have to be that all the time — in practice, in school, in the community. We've just got to understand that it doesn't just happen on Friday nights, or in this case, Tuesday night. We've got to go out here and earn it. If we do that, we'll be all right. We have talent."

The Whalers (9-2) lost their last two games after opening the season with nine straight wins. Jacob Commander scooped up quarterback Melquann Gomez's fumble and scored from one yard out with 41 seconds left to prevent the shutout.

The Green Knights (8-3) took the opposite route to the postseason, starting out at 0-2 before rolling. They won their fifth straight on Tuesday in convincing fashion, jumping out to a 24-0 halftime lead and cruising to the finish line. They rode the lethal senior duo of Joshua Witkowsky (27 carries, 118 yards, one TD) and Nico Ragaini, who scored four touchdowns.

The electrifying Ragaini opened the scoring with a pair of two-yard runs and added a 50-yard punt return for six before halftime. He out-jumped Monty Johnson in the corner and caught a 35-yard scoring strike from Chris Elias to increase the lead to 30-0 in the third quarter.

"Obviously, our schedule was tougher than theirs was, so we knew if we came in and punched them right in the face in the beginning that they would probably back down and that's exactly what happened," Ragaini, who owns the state record for career receptions.

The momentum quickly turned in Notre Dame's favor. New London's Elijah Parker had trouble handling the wet football on the opening kickoff and it squirted away. Notre Dame recovered at the NL 28-yard line.

Six plays later, Ragaini bolted into the end zone.

"We got a lucky bounce and we started rolling after that," Ragaini said.

The score remained 6-0 heading into the second quarter as Major Roman's interception in the end zone stopped one Notre Dame drive.

The game got out of hand after that. The Whalers had no luck moving the football and Commander fumbled the ball away at the New London 25. Ragaini ran it in from the two for a 12-0 lead.

When New London's next drive stalled, the Whalers were forced to punt again. Ragaini faded back to catch the ball at the midfield and used his blazing speed to get outside and finish the 50-yard return for a touchdown.

It didn't get any better for the Whalers in the second half. Gomez finished with two interceptions in his final game. Commander's 39-yard run late in the fourth quarter totaled more yards than the Whalers had gained up until that point and represented their first first down.

Notre Dame moves on to play at No. 2 New Canaan on Monday night in the Class L semifinals.

"They came down here full of confidence," Roman said. "Everyone and their mother was saying this is the team you don't want to play. So we go out there and shoot ourselves in the foot last week (against Norwich Free Academy) and end up playing them.

"It's like the NCAA tournament. They were a hot team and they came in and got after us."

g.keefe@theday.com