Pintos pitch 52-0 road shutout against Thoreau behind 5-TD night from Manley-Griego

THOREAU, N.M. — The Moriarty Pintos opened the football season with an emphatic statement on the road, rolling to a 52-0 shutout victory over the Thoreau Hawks.

Senior Mateo Manley-Griego spearheaded the offensive and special teams onslaught, finding the end zone five times. On the ground, Manley-Griego broke free for touchdown runs of 40, 50, and 20 yards. He added back-to-back punt returns for touchdowns and nearly had a third score in the return game negated by a penalty.

Despite the explosive individual performance, Manley-Griego credited his teammates for paving the way.

“I really just think it was our blockers, our blocking scheme on there,” Manley-Griego said. “It was wide open every time. I didn’t have to do much, but just run down the sideline.”

The lopsided win set the tone for a Moriarty squad with eyes on November, though the senior playmaker emphasized the team’s high standards.

“It feels really good, but wish we could have done a little better,” Manley-Griego said. “We’re looking to make a run to the state championship.”

Moriarty’s dynamic attack generated big plays from several key contributors. Mario Romero powered through the Thoreau defense for a pair of touchdown runs from 29 and eight yards out. Quarterback Devin Ortiz orchestrated the offense, connecting with Royce Dennisson on a 25-yard touchdown pass and adding a 6-yard touchdown run of his own. Ortiz also had a 50-plus-yard touchdown run called back due to a penalty.

On special teams, freshman Frankie Romero converted four extra-point kicks, while the return and coverage units dominated field position throughout the night.

“We came out, and the first two possessions we looked really, really good,” Moriarty head coach Gabriel Romero said. “We hit a little lull, but then we got things going again, and I thought we played pretty good tonight.”

Defensively, the Pintos stifled Thoreau from start to finish, quickly shutting down the perimeter to keep the Hawks off the scoreboard.

“At the very beginning, they were kind of rolling out, getting outside of us,” coach Romero said. “We made some adjustments, and the kids started taking that away. Once we did that, they had nowhere to go with their offense. I thought our defense stepped up and did a really good job.”

Special teams remained a deciding factor, highlighted by Manley-Griego’s dynamic returns and relentless kick coverage.

“Our special teams were really good tonight,” Romero said. “You hate to see that one get called back because kids are working so hard on it, but we got two other ones in. On kickoff, we had kids that were flying, getting down there making plays.”

Romero also highlighted the maturity and tone set by his upperclassmen.

“We have great senior leadership,” Romero said. “Watching them develop from freshmen to sophomores to juniors, you could see those qualities. Now as seniors, we’ve got some great leaders and they’re pushing others to do their best. When you have that kind of leadership from your players, it makes a huge difference.”

Even with the 52-point shutout in the books, Romero emphasized that the team will focus on cleaning up penalties as the season progresses.

“We’ve got a lot of really good kids and expectations are high,” Romero added. “The little mistakes that you can get away with in this game, we’ve got to clean up and make sure that we don’t make those mistakes further on down the road.”

Moriarty returns home next week to host the Pojoaque Valley Elks.