New-look Lawrence pounds its way to win
LAWRENCE >> Having lost both its quarterback and first two games, the Lawrence High football team had to change something to turn its season around.
Out with the new school. In with the old.
The Cardinals switched to the power Wing-T and ran for 236 total yards in a 20-14 victory over Hightstown on Friday night.
“We were pretty excited about the Wing-T,” said senior quarterback Deon McClean, who actually started the season opener at wide receiver. “It was new to us, but we’re ready to learn new things. I had to embrace it and take on the role because it’s a new position to me. It was a lot to take in, learning the offense in a short amount of time.”
Starting sophomore quarterback Brandon Deckard was injured in the seasonopener against Hopewell Valley and after getting outclassed by an outstanding Notre Dame team last week, Lawrence was sitting at 0-2 and without scoring any points.
Coach Rob Radice knew the Cards couldn’t run a spread no-huddle without a quarterback.
The veteran coach had the perfect right hand man to implement the change of system. Former Pennsbury coach Galen Snyder, the architect of the Ground & Pound, is on the staff.
So that’s exactly what Lawrence did.
“We had talked about being more efficient in the run game,” Radice said. “We were already running a lot of wing stuff, but we were doing it out of the (shotgun). We decided to get it under center this week and see what it looked like. We spent a lot of time just trying to perfect the nuances of the Wing-T. It was a good move on the kids’ part to buy into it.”
Careem Frost ran for 147 yards and a touchdown on nine carries to lead a Cards rushing attack that averaged 5.9 yards per carry.
Frost didn’t have a single rushing attempt last week against Notre Dame, and didn’t know how many chances he would get on Friday. Then he broke off a 62yard run that set up McLean’s 1-yard touchdown plunge with 10:31 left in the second quarter.
“Once I made the first play, I was like it’s my time to shine,” said Frost, a junior. “I’m a first-year offensive player, so it was a great chance to shine, show what we’re made of.”
Those were Lawrence’s first points of the season.
“It felt really good to finally get on the scoreboard,” McLean said. “It gave us some momentum.”
Perhaps feeling frisky after having success on the ground, the Cards (1-2) dialed up their only pass play in the last two weeks on a 4th-and-goal from the eight and McLean hit Matt Kildea for a touchdown and 12-0 halftime lead.
Hightstown (1-3) provided a contrasting style with an up tempo system. The Rams orchestrated a beautiful 75yard drive to open the second half that culminated in quarterback Danny Wersching’s 3-yard touchdown run.
Wersching completed 19of-28 passes for 215 yards and a touchdown. He hooked up with favorite target Jarrett Justice eight times for 82 yards and a touchdown.
Wersching’s 15-yard scoring pass to Justice in the fourth quarter answered a 26-yard touchdown run by Frost and set up for an exciting finish.
Hightstown got the ball back on its on 21 with 3:15 remaining and no timeouts. The Rams drove to the Lawrence 48 with one minute left, but a botched hand off was recovered by the Cards’ Diesel Barnes.
“Two weeks in a row we’ve had the ball to either tie or go ahead and we kind of ran out of time,” Hightstown coach Ryan Fullen said. “We had a turnover there at the end.”
Lawrence, however, had a reason to smile.
“That’s all hard work,” Frost said. “We worked our butts off all week and the outcome showed.”
Hightstown (1-3) 0 0 7 7 — 14 Lawrence (1-2) 01208—20
L- McLean 1 run (kick no good)
L- Kildea 8 pass from McLean (kick no good)
Hi- Wersching 3 run (Salter kick)
L- Frost 26 run (McLean run)
Hi- Justice 15 pass from Wersching (Salter kick)