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Green Wave visit Noxapater
Cathedral High head football coach Ron Rushing will have to put off his hunting time this week.
Rushing will be busy preparing his Green Wave football team for the South A State championship game in Noxapater.
"I was trying to figure out a way to set my DVD up in a tree stand to watch film on Saturday," Rushing joked. "Actually this is where you want to be as a coach and team. There are four teams left and we're excited to be one of them. We're going to keep our schedule the same and try to keep everything as normal as we can."
Cathedral advanced to South State for the first time since 1997 when they defeated Nanih Waiya 33-19 Friday at D'Evereaux Stadium.
The Green Wave lost to Scott Central in the 1997 semifinals. In 1993, Cathedral advanced to the Class A state championship game, falling to Smithville.
Cathedral's football team has made it to the semifinals two other times.
Cathedral put up 509 yards of offense in the game while allowing 408 to Nanih Waiya. Much of the Warriors' yards came from Johnson, who ran for 188 yards on 26 carries.
Cathedral took the opening drive of the game 80 yards in 13 plays. A 9-yard touchdown pass from Caleb Upton to Khalil Brice capped the drive. The extra point failed, and Cathedral led 6-0.
Cathedral scored again with 2:58 to go in the first quarter when Upton found Tyler Flemming for an 18-yard touchdown strike. The two-point pass failed to put the Green Wave up 12-0 at the end of one period.
Upton threw for 251 yards and four touchdowns in the first half alone. He finished his night with 271 yards on 22-48 passing. He also ran for 51 yards
Cathedral stretched its lead to 20-0 with 4:32 to go in the second quarter when Upton found Hammitte for a 30-yard touchdown. Jadarius Ealey ran the two-point conversion.
Cathedral capped the first-half scoring with just four seconds to go when Upton found Huffines for an 8-yard score.
The two-point run failed giving the Green Wave a 26-0 halftime lead.
Carl Hammitte caught seven passes for 126 yards and one score. Daniel Huffines caught five passes for 45 yards and one touchdown.
Nanih Waiya threatened to score just once in the first half. The Warriors advanced the ball to the Cathedral 13-yard line before Flemming stripped the ball from running back Martin Johnson and returned it 27 yards. That turnover set up Cathedral's final touchdown of the half.
The Warriors ended the night with seven turnovers.
Ealey ran for 65 yards on two carries on Cathedral's next possession. He capped off the drive with a 12-yard touchdown run.
He finished the night with 133 yards on 16 carries.
The Lee Fairbanks extra point made the score 33-13.
"Everything worked out about how we hoped," Rushing said. "We played a really good first half. We created some turnovers. Our offense wasn't clicking like it has, but we had some big plays."
Noxapater drummed Dexter 56-6 in the first round and advanced to South State by defeating Stringer 28-27.
Tiger quarterback Ethan Hamilton passed for 150 yards and three touchdowns in the Dexter contest.
Trey Baber had 14 carries for 144 yards and one rushing touchdown, as well as 3 receptions for 103 yards and one receiving touchdown. Katorris Coburn had 11 carries for 89 yards and one touchdown.
Against Stringer, the Red Devils rallied from a 21-7 deficit to pull within 28-27 in the final minute of their Class 1-A playoff game at Noxapater, but quarterback Tevin Moore was stopped short of the end zone as the Red Devils went for the 2-point conversion and the victory.
As a team, the Red Devils rolled up over 450 yards of offense.
Hamilton ran for three touchdowns and Barber had the fourth TD for the Tigers against Stringer.
"They are very fast," Rushing said. "They return most of their team from last year. They run the option out of the shotgun. Their quarterback is 6-2, 200 and runs the ball well. We will have to play our best game of the year."
All right, so since it is a given that LSU is going to be in the national championship game, why doesn't all these talking heads from ESPN, CBS, USA Today, etc., just tell us who they will be playing, who will win the game and go ahead and give them that crystal bowl-looking thing now?
Why should LSU even play Arkansas or in the SEC Championship Game? It's obvious they should win by 100 points or everybody would not be looking past both games.
C'mon, two weeks ago even the Times-Picayune had a poll earlier this month asking who people thought LSU should play.
Why not ask who the Saints' opponent should be in the Super Bowl while you are at it.
I have to admit I was hoping there would be no re-match with Alabama "IF" LSU made it to the national championship game.
But after Oklahoma, Oregon and Oklahoma State went down (didn't they know they were not supposed to lose), it's looking more and more like a re-match. And not just LSU-Alabama. It could be LSU-Arkansas or Arkansas-Alabama.
But after a week or so, I got to thinking, re-match or no re-match, it would be great to see LSU in the national championship game no matter the circumstances.
Let's face it, next year is supposed to be the year. But how many times have you seen supposed turn into disappointing?
But first things first. It can turn real disappointing with a loss to Arkansas. And the Razorbacks' strengths are some of LSU's weaknesses.
Arkansas has running backs who can catch the ball out of the backfield and LSU's linebackers have not done a good job defending that well at all this year, especially against talented backs.
The Razorbacks also have explosive Joe Adams returning kicks. If the LSU offense is not able to move the ball enough for Brad Wing to down it inside the Razorback 20-yard line, watch out for Adams. There have been a few breakdowns on special teams for the Tigers and that's a few too many.
And, of course, there's that quarterback situation. Tiger fans have gone to feeling real good about it with Jarrett Lee starting and Jordan Jefferson coming in for relief. But now it's back to 2010 when LSU fans are not feeling good at all about the position.
If LSU does get by Arkansas, you are looking at playing Georgia in the SEC Championship game in Georgia.
The Bulldogs are playing much better football right now and will go in with an attitude of nothing to lose and everything to gain.
Mark Richt is an outstanding coach and will have a solid game plan.
Now they are saying if LSU beats Arkansas they can lose to Georgia and still be in the BCS Championship Game.
There's still a long way to go before LSU plays Alabama, oh wait, Arkansas, Oregon, oh wait Oklahoma, oh wait, Oklahoma State.
Oh wait, LSU? |
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