For this game, Whiteland football coach Darrin Fisher figured it was what’s up front that counts.
“To pull out a ‘Rocky’ term, the body, the body the body,” Fisher said. “If we were going to win, we talked all week about body blows, and our offensive and defensive lines were going to win the football game. It was pretty evident on both sides; our guys up front played great.”
Helped by four interceptions, the Class 5A No. 3 Warriors scored a 24-13 decision over Class 6A No. 7 Lawrence North Friday night.
Senior Peyton Emberton rushed for 164 yards on 22 carries, including a TD, to lead the host Warriors (2-0).
“He’s a workhorse,” Fisher said. “He’s a guy we count on to give him the ball. Our offensive line and our fullback Devon Armstrong played great. Some games teams take the perimeter away like they did this week. We almost had too many holding calls trying to get to the perimeter. (Quarterback) Kevin Denham did a great job of managing the game.”
Emberton said the offensive line got up to the second level of defenders and sometimes the third level.
“They were pushing the defensive line like crazy,” Emberton said. “It was ground and pound.”
Fisher was delighted with the defensive play, in particular the secondary.
“Our corners, Nyrius Moore-Smith, Maalik Perkins and Andrian Kolleigbo played really well,” Fisher said. “We were playing extra defensive backs. Our defensive coaches had an excellent game plan.”
Perkins and Kolleigbo each had an interception. Moore-Smith had two, including one for a 70-yard touchdown return which gave the Warriors a 24-7 lead with 7:22 to go in the fourth quarter.
“I was just ready for it and I just saw the end zone,” Moore-Smith said. “We knew what they were going to do and we locked it up.”
Moore-Smith had also snuffed out a Wildcats drive with an interception at his own 3-yard line in the third quarter.
A 26-yard field goal by David Mathis gave Whiteland a 17-7 lead with 9:39 left in the fourth.
Following Moore-Smith’s 70-yard interception return, Lawrence North (1-1) got its final score late. Tanner Aspeslet threw a 24-yard TD pass to Mario Lomax with 45 seconds left. The two-point conversion and the onside kick both failed.
The Wildcats took a 7-0 lead on a 21-yard TD pass from Montez Jones to Robert Oldham on the final play of the first quarter. Whiteland tied it at 7-all on 1-yard run by Denham with 7:59 left in the second quarter.
Helped by an interception by Kolleigbo at Whiteland 1-yard line, the Warriors launched a 99-yard drive, scoring on Emberton’s 12-yard run with 1:13 to go.
Lawrence North missed a 38-yard field goal with less than two seconds left in the first half.
“This town needed something good to happen,” Fisher said, referring to this week’s fatal shooting of a Whiteland student. “It’s been a rough couple of days here. These guys played with a lot of emotion for their school and their town, because they needed it. And boy, did they respond.”
