"Hopefully," Lee said, "our guys learned a lesson today."

The Falcons have been taken to school by opponents all year and Enfield, mired in a season just like SPGT where little has gone right, secured its first victory -- a 36-14 decision -- in a game marred by a fight just before the third period ended.

Lee and his coaching staff made quick work to quell the melee along with Enfield coach Jay Gaucher and his assistants.

There’s no excuse for such behavior, but frustration and trash talk do mix the same way as gasoline and fire.

"We seemed more ready to play after that fight," Lee said. "But my players have to come ready to play the game, not fight to get themselves going."

And that’s what bothered the first-year coach of the Falcons.

As tough as the going has been recently against some of the Nutmeg League’s top clubs, Lee could take solace in the way his players competed.

"We’ve talked all season about how you practice is how you’re going to play in a game and the last couple of days of practice, our guys weren’t serious at all," Lee said.

The Falcons managed to stay in this one for much of the first half largely because of Kyle Abucewicz. The SPGT punter booted a pair that pinned the Raiders deep in their own territory.

One of the kicks resulted in a safety when the SPGT line sacked Enfield QB Pat Jubrey in the end zone with 3:09 left in the first quarter to make it a 6-2 game.

But turnovers -- three in a span of eight minutes in the second quarter -- shifted the momentum.

Enfield turned a fumble recovery, an interception and botched SPGT kickoff return into three scores to erect a 28-2 cushion and essentially put the game on ice.

"It got a little sloppy towards the end of the game," Gaucher said, "but we try to play every game hard and come to battle.

"The breaks haven’t gone our way too often in what’s really a rebuilding year for us," Gaucher said. "At this point, we figured we be better (record-wise), but our depth chart wasn’t deep coming into the season because of graduation."

Maybe if the Raiders had more players to go with Jubrey this year, Enfield, coming off a trip to the Class M playoffs in 2003, would certainly own a better winning percentage.

Jubrey (9-for-14, 207 yards, 3 TD passes, 1 INT) showed plenty of accuracy against SPGT and sandwiched TD tosses of 13 yards to Ray Newman and 14 yards to Rob Reisigg around an 11-yard TD run by Jerry Moore to break open the game.

Enfield also had a big effort from running back Dominique Lindo who ran 53 yards for the game’s first score and also caught a 53-yard TD pass from Jubrey in the second half.

The Falcons, meanwhile, amassed 300 yards in total offense led by Kenny Byrd who rushed for 142 yards (on 23 carries) and scored on touchdown runs of 53 and 1 yard.

Byrd and Jamel Greenlee altered at quarterback with the latter completing 3 of 9 for 54 yards. Fullback Brent Seaver also contributed to SPGT’s attack with 54 yards on 11 carries.

With three games left, the Falcons, face powerful East Catholic this coming week, remain one of the fewest teams in the state yet to get a victory.

"We took a step backwards," Lee said. "We’ll keep working with the goal being to stick together as a team."