Eagles blank Hornets, cap perfect regular season
Pick up third straight shutout, cap perfect regular season on senior night
The North Point Eagles shut out the visiting Great Mills Hornets in a Southern Maryland Athletic Conference Potomac Division football contest on Thursday evening on a night when the Eagles program honored their 21 seniors.
“It was a smaller senior class this year with 21 of them. A lot of these guys have been with us for four years and have put a tremendous amount of time and effort into our program,” North Point head coach Tom Petre said. “It means a lot to us. It is more than just football, it is about them growing into good young men and working hard in the classroom and being good citizens. That is the bulk of what our program is and I am proud of them.”
North Point (10-0, 6-0 SMAC Potomac) won by shutout for the third straight week as it wrapped up a perfect regular season.
“A lot of people didn’t know whether
we could go 10-0, but we went 10-0 and are glad to do that but we are onto the next season which is playoffs,” Eagles junior quarterback Asa Williams said.
In the first quarter, Williams connected on a 15-yard touchdown pass to senior wide receiver Malik Lawrence to put the Eagles up 6-0 after senior Evan Patterson’s extra point was no good.
The Eagles put up 20 points in the second quarter off of three passing touchdowns from Williams. Williams finished the game completing 10 of 14 passes for 223 yards and four touchdowns.
“It was a good win. We came in prepared and did what we had to do,” Williams said.
Williams connected on a deep ball over the middle to senior wide receiver Deandre Beverly for a 67-yard touchdown during the first minute of the second quarter.
Beverly scored his second touchdown of the game on a 20-yard pass from Williams with 5:59 remaining in the first half.
Beverly finished with a game-high 87 yards receiving on two receptions, both of which went for touchdowns.
“We are focused and locked in. Today we weren’t really locked in, but we are going to be locked in next week,” Williams said.
Williams’ final touchdown pass of the game was to senior wide receiver Jimmy Warner with 3:27 left in the first half to give North Point a 26-0 halftime lead.
“I feel like today was a good end to my regular season career,” senior Cam’Ron Inn said. “I just feel like we are going to come out strong next week and even stronger moving on.”
In the second half, junior running back Corey Johnson found the endzone with 8:39 left in the third quarter to put the Eagles up 33-0 after Patterson’s extra point was good.
Johnson finished the game with 19 carries for 80 yards.
“This was a good win for the guys, I am proud of them for rounding out the season the way they did and kind of where they are at right now,” Petre said. “But we got some work to do heading into Week 11.”
The final score of the game came on a 24-yard field goal by Patterson with 2:35 left in the third quarter.
“North Point is really tough. Their record shows it,” Hornets head coach Tyrone Bell said. “They show up every week for the game, and this is actually the most disciplined I have ever seen them. They are playing real clean right now and look primed for a run.”
The Eagles earned a home playoff game as the No. 2 seed in the 4A East Region playoffs. They are scheduled to host Arundel (9-1) at 7 p.m. Friday.
“It feels great, it is our second year in a row [going undefeated]. Now it is on to playoffs, and we are just looking to do better than last year,” Inn said.
Last year, North Point lost in the 4A state semifinals to Quince Orchard of Montgomery County and will look to make it farther this time around.
“Regular season is leaving their footprint, and playoff time they can leave a legacy. I am proud of these guys,” Petre said.
Great Mills (3-7, 3-3) won three of their last five games to end the season.
“I am actually very happy with the season. The season started off rough and we made some changes and it seemed to go in a positive direction. Now we are going to see if we can feed off of that going into next year. We have our whole line returning next year,” Bell said. “We will have to replace a lot of our skill guys, which is going to hurt us, but at the same time we have some young guys coming up that I am really excited about. Our quarterback comes back, so we are going to build off of that and hopefully have a strong offseason to really show something on the field.”