Greenwich celebrates its 2022 Class LL football championship victory over Fairfield Prep, 37-17, at Rentschler Field, East Hartford, Saturday, December 10, 2022.

O n Rentschler Field, after his team won the Class LL football championship on Saturday night, Greenwich coach Anthony Morello said he didn’t think much about the possibility of his Cardinals being No. 1 in the GameTimeCT Top 10 Poll. “Our goal was to win the state championship, and we accomplished that goal,” he said. “Whatever you writers determine is the best fit, we’re happy with.” Well, 17 media members thought they fit on top. The other seven in our poll put them second. For the second time, Greenwich tops the season-ending poll, right back where they started the season. Their restoration caps off a strange season in which four different teams spent at least a week at No. 1, Southington had three separate stints there. In a year when no Class LL or Class L team reached the playoffs undefeated, the Cardinals (11-2) are the first team with more than one loss ever to finish No. 1 in the GameTimeCT or New Haven Register polls, which date to 1961.

Those losses were both by one point, to Southington in Week 4 (which sent the Blue Knights on a string of six of their eight weeks at the top) and to Staples on Thanksgiving. “You have to bear down in the toughest of moments and everybody’s got to do self-reflection, look in the mirror,” Morello said after the championship game.

“I’m not going to sit here and say we did this wrong, we did that wrong, at least not publicly. We’ll have our talks inside. But ultimately, coaches lose games and players win it. That’s the story here today and the story in the playoffs.”

The Cardinals first earned the No. 1 ranking in 2018, their previous Class LL championship.

Greenwich gave up 24 points combined in three playoff games. The Cardinals allowed that many or more in five individual games during the regular season.

“Look, (the defense was) spoken badly upon throughout the middle of the season,” Greenwich quarterback Jack Wilson said. “They have come up absolutely huge for us. They turned it around. The way they’re playing right now — I mean the way they finished the season out — it’s an unbelievable response from them.”

Class L champion New Canaan received five of the other seven first-place votes, did not fall below fourth on any other ballots and took the No. 2 spot in the poll. The Rams gave up only 125 points in 13 games. (New Canaan’s Ty Groff scored 91 points as a kicker.)

“This group of seniors especially, I’m going to miss them a lot,” coach Lou Marinelli said after the Rams won the Class L final 16-13 over Maloney. “With our best players getting hurt, losing kids for the season, then to be able to accomplish this, it’s unbelievable.”

Only five teams were unbeaten going into the playoffs, only two made it to the finals unbeaten, and only Class S champion Ansonia completed a 13-0 season. The Chargers picked up those other two first-place votes and finished fifth, narrowly; they’d somehow ranked eighth in each of the past nine consecutive polls.

“I want to find another undefeated team in Connecticut that’s ever been behind six times in the second half and came back and won,” Ansonia coach Tom Brockett said after the Class S final. “You take that stat — I don’t care about No. 1 or No. 2 — that’s the Connecticut team of the year. I don’t know where they rank, but I’ll go to war with those guys over any other team. I can’t say enough about their heart.”

Class L runner-up Maloney was third, as the Spartans were in the final regular-season poll; they’d spent Week 10 at No. 1. Class LL runner-up Fairfield Prep was fourth, its highest ranking since it was preseason No. 3.

Class M champion Notre Dame-West Haven and Class MM champ North Haven were close behind Ansonia in sixth and seventh. St. Joseph, ranked second heading into the playoffs before Cheshire upset the Hogs in the Class L quarterfinals, was eighth, narrowly ahead of former No. 1 Southington, which was narrowly ahead of 10th-ranked Staples.

There was a gap from the Wreckers to the also-receiving-votes contingent, headed by West Haven, the fourth and final team to have held the top spot, with Class SS champion Barlow nearby.

In all, 26 teams got points in this final poll and 46 teams received at least one vote this season. Class SS runner-up Valley Regional/Old Lyme received its first two votes of the year this week.

mfornabaio@ctpost.com; @fornabaioctp; Pete Paguaga contributed to this report.

Dropped out: West Haven (5), Newtown (9).

First-place votes in parentheses and points tabulated on a 30-28-26-24-22-20-18-16-14-12-11-10-9-8-7 basis.

Also receiving votes: West Haven (9-2) 200; Barlow (11-2) 192; Killingly (11-2) 176; Berlin (12-1) 145; Trumbull (8-4) 143; Newtown (9-2) 124; Bloomfield (10-3) 111; Cheshire (7-5) 75; Glastonbury (9-3) 69; Shelton (7-5) 68; Law (10-2) 49; Hamden (8-3) 28; Valley Regional/Old Lyme (11-2) 17; Naugatuck (8-3) 16; Holy Cross (9-3) 8; Cromwell/Portland (10-2) 7.

The Following Voted: Cameron Beall, New Britain Herald; Adam Betz, Journal-Inquirer of Manchester; Serenity Bishop, Bristol Press; Sean Patrick Bowley, GameTimeCT; Kels Dayton, Hartford Courant; Gerry deSimas Jr., Collinsville Press; Justin DeVellis, News 12 Connecticut; Mike DiMauro, The Day of New London; Erik Dobratz, WTNH-8; Scott Ericson, Stamford Advocate; Michael Fornabaio, Connecticut Post; Ned Griffen, The Day of New London; Mark Jaffee, Republican-American of Waterbury; Tim Jensen, Patch Media Corp.; Greg Lederer, Cheshire Herald; Gabby Lucivero, NBC CT; Mike Madera, Walter Camp Football Foundation; Joe Morelli, New Haven Register; Pete Paguaga, GameTimeCT; Dave Phillips, Shoreline Newspapers; Dave Ruden, The Ruden Report; Richard Zalusky, The Chronicle of Willimantic; Jimmy Zanor, Norwich Bulletin; Joe Zone, WFSB-3.