FOOTBALL: Warriors' defense stops South Central

By Rudy Coggins
Published in Sports on September 24, 2016 11:31 PM

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Eastern Wayne's offense didn't finish the job.

It's defense did.

South Central cashed in two fourth-quarter fumbles, but the Warriors closed the bank before the Falcons could make their final two withdrawals on Friday evening.

Sophomore free safety Junious Tyson and junior defensive end Chris Stephens stopped SC quarterback Dexter McDuffie on the game-winning two-point conversion. Less than two minutes later, Tyson picked off a McDuffie pass to seal the Warriors' 25-24 victory.

"What a major stop," EW head coach Tavares Oates said.

Down 13 points, the Falcons recovered a dropped ball on a punt attempt. The miscue led to McDuffie's 9-yard TD run. After an exchange of possessions, another the Warriors coughed up the ball again and Nazir Monroe-Smith eventually found the end zone from 10 yards out.

McDuffie lined up his team for two-point conversion and a lineman jumped.

False start.

SC reset itself, McDuffie took the snap and tried to find some running room outside. Tyson got him by the ankles and Stephens hit him belt high to preserve the precarious one-point lead.

"A lot of times you have that little chart in your back pocket that tells you mathematically about what you ought to do," said South Central head coach Andy Tew when asked about going for two instead of kicking the PAT to possibly force overtime.

"But coaches have to have a feel for the game, and feel like what would be the best play we could execute. If we felt like an extra point was the best play we could have executed, we would have kicked the extra point. If we felt like we had the momentum and an offensive play was the best play we could execute at that moment, then that's what we did.

"We felt like our offense had done a great job, had them on their heels a little bit and we were going to capitalize on that momentum."

Eastern Wayne fell behind 6-0 on the opening kickoff -- a 78-yard return to the house by Tre'Quan Smith. The Warriors scratched to within 6-5 on a safety and Brennan Dove's 33-yard field goal.

SC moved back in front 12-6 before the Warriors found a little swagger on offense. Zeke Best orchestrated an 11-play drive that ended on a 15-yard touchdown pass to Alex Sharpless -- a fade route to the far right corner.

Nearly seven minutes later, the Best-Sharpless executed the same play to make it 18-6. Sharpless ended the night with 51 yards on just four receptions. Best was 9 of 14 for 90 yards with completions to four different receivers.

"I tell Zeke with someone like Alex, just throw it up in the air where he can go get it," Oates said of his 6-foot-4 receiver. "Alex and I have probably repped out close to 50 jump balls in practice. Getting his confidence up can definitely help us out as far as our running game."

EW took the third-quarter kickoff and marched 47 yards on six plays, ending the drive with Malyk Williams' 10-yard TD run.

But the Warriors turned conservative offense, failed to sustain drives and pressured its defense to protect its two-TD advantage. Time management also factored into the outcome when SC had 70 seconds to set up McDuffie's final heave that resulted in Tyson's pick.

Game notes:

THE HISTORY

* Eastern Wayne won its fourth consecutive Eastern Carolina 3-A/4-A Conference opener -- all against South Central. The Warriors lead the all-time series 8-2.

INSIDE THE NUMBERS

* The Warriors amassed 295 yards of total offense on 70 plays and averaged 4.2 yards per down. South Central collected 274 yards on 62 plays -- an average of 4.4 on each down.

LESSON LEARNED?

* Malyk Williams missed the first half due to disciplinary reasons.

"(He's) a great athlete, a great contributor to this team," Oates said. "It takes all parts of being involved in this program ... accountability and responsibility within the school. (He) has to understand he is part of a team and anything outside of that results in consequences."

NEXT

* Eastern Wayne (3-2) snapped a two-game skid and is the guest of New Bern (1-4) next Friday.