WALES — The Wells football team experienced a classic season opener on Saturday afternoon.

Some early sloppiness on both sides of the ball, littered with a few penalties.

But through it all, the Warriors also found offensive balance and turned in a shutout on defense on the way to a 31-0 Class D South victory over Oak Hill at Stacen Doucette Memorial Field.

“We should have done some things better, give (Oak Hill) credit, they played tough,” Wells head coach Tim Roche said. “The penalties, that can’t happen down the road in these games that we’re going to have. And I realize it’s the first game, but this week we’ve got to work hard to get rid of those things.”

Wells (1-0) had three running backs — Dominic Carbonneau (73 yards), Dominic Capello (85 yards) and Dom Buxton (61 yards) — account for 222 rushing yards, while senior quarterback Brooks Fox was 7 of 13 passing for 155 yards, two touchdowns and an interception.

“(Fox) stepped up in the trenches over the summer, and I’ve been working with him,” said Capello, a senior fullback. “He’s stepped up a lot, and I’m very proud of him.”

The game represented Wells’ return to the Class D ranks. The Warriors were previously in Class D from 2017-2018, with a 24-0 record and two state championships during that stretch.

Running back Hunter Drew was the offensive leader for Oak Hill (0-1), rushing for 70 yards on 14 carries.

Wells capped its first two possessions with touchdowns through the air. On Wells’ opening drive, Fox found Conner Whitten on a play action bootleg for a 14-yard scoring toss. On the Warriors’ next possession, Fox reared back and heaved a deep pass to a wide-open Dyllan Davis, who was running a fly pattern, for a 66-yard touchdown.

“We’re trying to throw a little bit more,” Roche said. “Brooks, I think he’s underrated (as a passer) and he’s one of the hardest workers I’ve ever had. He went to all the passing camps. He went to Maine Elite. He went everywhere he could to become better. I thought he had a great game, made a couple little mistakes, but we can work on those. Other than that, he had a great game.”

Buxton added a 25-yard touchdown run late in the first half to give Wells a 19-0 halftime lead.

Wells cleaned up some of its penalty struggles in the second half and notched two more touchdowns — a 20-yard run by Capello and a 5-yard run by Carbonneau — for the final 31-0 score.

Despite being outmanned, the Raiders were game throughout the contest, and started finding a rhythm offensively in the fourth quarter. Freshman quarterback Kai Taylor was 6 of 16 passing for 62 yards but showed an ability to move Oak Hill down the field on its final drive, before throwing an interception to Wells defensive back Riley Murphy in the final seconds of the game.

“I’m actually very pleased with how we performed,” Oak Hill head coach Chad Stowell said. “We’ve only got a couple of seniors… This is the first day we’ve seen Wells punt. There are steps in the right direction. A (defensive) shutout in the third quarter. We moved the ball (offensively).

“I’m very happy with (the team’s fight),” Stowell continued. “We talked about before the game, this is the ultimate measuring stick. How do we measure against this team? Obviously, today we showed we don’t measure up with them, but we have the ability to compete with them, and that’s going to be the big deal. In Class D South, everybody makes the playoffs, we just have to make sure we’re better in November than we are in September.”

The Warriors had 401 offensive yards, while Oak Hill had 165.

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