Green’s big plays carry Rams to 2nd title
JAMES CITY — Had he simply gotten off the punt and Lafayette held on to its one-touchdown lead for the final 95 seconds, Mike Green would still have been remembered as the most valuable player of the Rams’ second-ever state football championship victory.
But Green, a Virginia Cavaliers recruit, turned a poor snap into a 40-yard adventure to the end zone, during which he broke at least four tackles. The touchdown, with 1 minute, 27 seconds remaining, clinched the Rams’ 27-13 win over Lord Botetourt in the Class 3 state final Saturday at Wanner Stadium.
Lafayette won its first state title since 2001 and is the first Bay Rivers District team to win it all since Poquoson in 2010.
“That’s the absolute greatest play I’ve seen by a Lafayette player and I’ve been here since (1997),” said Andy Linn, the Rams’ head coach the past decade.
That’s saying something,
because Green’s 28-yard touchdown reception of Luke Hanson’s pass while falling backward in the front corner of the end zone against blanket cover
age was pretty spectacular. That gave the Rams (9-0) a 10-7 lead with 9:36 to play in the third quarter.
Lord Botetourt (9-1) retaliated with the kind of fury you’d expect from a team with 11 Division I recruits, and which was averaging 48 points per game. The Cavaliers drove 64 yards on five running plays, with Dylan Wade scoring on a 2-yard run — set up by his 44-yard run two plays earlier — to take a 13-10 lead.
But that was the only time the Cavaliers, led by 6-foot-6, 272-pound Gunner Givens, a 5-star offensive lineman, pushed the Rams around all afternoon. Middle linebacker Green was constantly around the ball or pressuring the quarterback from the edge. When he, linebacker Aidan Byron, safety Bryce Cupp and the rest of the defense forced the Cavaliers to punt on their first three possessions, it was clear Lafayette was in it to win it.
“I think that was big because it set the tone for the game,” Byron said of the early stops. “Everybody talked about them jamming it down our throat, but we’ve got a defense that shuts that down so they’re meeting a rock when they run in the middle.”
Although running back Hunter Rice (20 carries, 98 yards) did not approach his average of 10.2 yards per carry, his block of a Lafayette punt paved the way for his 1-yard touchdown run that gave Lord Botetourt a 7-0 lead with 5:16 to play in the first half. Hanson’s 42-yard completion to Luke Gatling set up Cannon Newell’s 40-yard field goal on the final play of the second quarter, and Lafayette trailed 7-3 at halftime.
After bending on Lord Botetourt’s touchdown drive in the third quarter, the Lafayette defense retook control and led the way to the title. Cupp returned an interception 20 yards to the Cavaliers’ 8, setting up Hanson’s 1-yard touchdown run that gave the Rams the lead at 17-13 with 11:54 to play.
On the Cavaliers’ next series, Green pressured quarterback Sammy Peery into a harried pass that Byron intercepted and returned to the Lord Botetourt 9. The Cavaliers held, but Newell kicked a 22-yard field goal to increase Lafayette’s lead to 20-13 with 9:51 to go.
Lafayette’s defensive momentum only increased as it forced a punt on the next series before Byron recovered a fumble to stop a Lord Botetourt march into Rams territory. Moments later, Green clinched the title with his run after plucking the poor punt snap off of the Wanner Stadium carpet.
He broke tackles running toward the right sideline and broke more when he cut back to his left. He overpowered a would-be tackler at the 10 before crossing the goal line.
“I always told myself if the snap was too high or too low, I was going to take a chance, regardless,” Green said. “After it went over my head, I said, ‘I’m going for this one.’
“It felt great and when I got to the goal line, I said, ‘We’ve been working for this state championship for so long and we’ve made it.’
“We earned it, to be honest.”
Notable stats: LB - Rice 20-98, TD rushing; Wade 14-110, TD rushing; Peery 2-14-3, 22 yards passing; Lafayette - Reel 20-65 rushing; Green 1-40, TD rushing, 6-66, TD receiving; Hanson 8-24-0, TD passing, 6-21, TD rushing.