Corum's touchdown run helps Warriors

By Rudy Coggins
Published in Sports on November 7, 2015 11:16 PM

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rcoggins@newsargus.com

Devonte Corum made sure he and his fellow seniors got one more home game this season Friday night.

"It felt great," Corum said after his 50-yard touchdown run proved to be the deciding score in a 27-19 conquest of Eastern Carolina 3-A/4-A Conference rival Charles B. Aycock.

The Warriors clinched the league's No. 1 seed for the N.C. High School Athletic Association 3-A (small school) playoffs and entertain 11th-seeded South Johnston next week. The Golden Falcons drew the No. 16 seed and are the guests of top-seeded Eastern Alamance.

Each game kicks off at 7 p.m.

Clinging to a 20-12 lead, the Warriors took over at their own 25-yard line with 7-plus minutes left in the game. Five rushing plays netted 21 yards and set up a third-and-1 with the football resting within inches of the midfield stripe.

Corum took the handoff from quarterback Zeke Best. Sophomore linemen Kris Wells and Nick Perkins sustained their blocks and the 5-foot-5 Corum easily slipped through the gap.

"That was a big run by Devonte," EW head coach Phil Gray said. "The kids played hard. Like I told the seniors, 'it's now or never.' This could have been their last home game."

Eastern Wayne (4-6 overall, 2-4 ECC) played with a sense of urgency throughout the regular-season finale, and aggressively tackled Aycock's ball carriers. The Warriors filled the gaps and took away the outside with the help of speedster AJ McNair, who recently moved to the end position.

McNair helped turn Golden Falcon ball carriers to the inside, which allowed senior linebacker Ethan Molloy and his teammates to prevent long-yardage plays.

"We felt like if we stopped the run, we would win the game because we felt like our corners were more athletic and we'd be able to cover them," Molloy said.

The Golden Falcons (4-7, 2-4) played passive after their initial touchdown drive -- a flawless 11-play series that covered 59 yards and ended with Caleb Gough's 8-yard scoring run.

Aycock came up empty on its next seven offensive possessions. False start and illegal shift penalties put the Golden Falcons behind the chains on occasion. The defense allowed two big touchdown runs of 69 and 52 yards by senior KK Best within a 1 1/2-minute span.

Best hauled in a 14-yard scoring pass just before halftime after a botched punt gave the Warriors a short field to run their offense. EW led 20-6 at that point.

"KK is the best player in the county and might be one of the best east of (Interstate) 95," CBA head coach Steve Brooks said. "I felt like they had three kids that played on one leg harder than our kids did at times on two legs. Credit to them.

"I can tell you it felt like Eastern Wayne played harder on defense than we did on offense. It might show different on film, or it might show that Eastern Wayne is just better than us. I thought we did a lot of good things at times, but we just got bitten by the bug of consistency."

Flowers closed the gap to 20-12 with a 29-yard touchdown pass to Ty Ford barely two minutes into the fourth quarter. Corum answered with his TD run, and Flowers found Damien Darden for a 27-yard scoring strike. The area's leading passer, Flowers threw for 195 yards and two touchdowns on 16 completions.

Eastern Wayne owned a 378-321 in total offensive yards, and claimed its fourth straight win in the series.