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WALBURG— Alfonzo Miller trotted onto the field for North Rowan’s first possession, came out of the huddle and walked under center, ready to accept the snap.
Why Miller didn’t continue down the line to his usual wide receiver spot left Ledford’s players and coaches scratching their heads. The Panthers knew all about star Cavalier QB Graham Hosch and all those passing yards. They didn’t know a thing about this Miller character, except that he caught a lot of balls in North Rowan’s five-wide receiver set.
By the end of Friday night’s key 2A Central Carolina Conference clash, Ledford knew Miller all too well. He ran for 106 yards on 29 carries. He handed the ball off 22 more times, and finished with only 14 passing attempts.
The scoreboard flashed 26-22 North Rowan at the end of the game, but the Panthers still weren’t sure who’d beaten them — no Cavalier team in recent memory had ever rushed for 224 yards and thrown for only 52.
“They threw a wrench in,” Ledford head coach Dickie Cline said. “We were expecting No. 4 at quarterback. If we had known going into the game some of those things were going to take place, I think we’d have been better prepared for it.It caught us off balance, but we should have adjusted better than we did.”
North’s No. 4, Hosch, injured his knee last Friday against South Rowan, practiced late in the week, then injured it again in gym class yesterday. That meant RowanCounty’s passing leader gave way to Miller, turning the Cavalier offense upside down.
How upside down? On its first possession, North (3-4 overall, 2-0 CCC) drove the ball 76 yards on 19 plays, taking 7:23 off the clock to tie the game at 7-all. Miller ran the ball nine times on the drive, including the score from 1 yard out. Marcus Lawing had six carries. And Miller actually completed 3-of-4 passes for 21 yards to keep the defense honest.
“I knew we were going to have to have a big ground game today because of Alfonzo Miller,”North’s Chris Phillips said. “I really didn’t know what to expect, though.”
The aerial shootout was a bust. With Hosch already out, the stage was set for Ledford quarterback Jared Hall, who entered the game with 1,323 yards and 11 touchdowns to go with just three interceptions.
Hall helped Ledford (5-2, 1-1) to a 14-13 halftime advantage by completing 6-of-7 passes for 72 yards. Both teams had just three possessions in the first half after the Panthers went 80 yards on 10 plays on their first drive and 51 yards on 10 plays on the second before finally having to punt.
An onsides kick to open the second half put the ball back in Hall’s hands, and he quickly completed passes of 12 and 16 yards. With Ledford poised to extend the lead, Hall snuck up the middle on third down, shot past the 5-yard line — and lost the football when Ray Johnson Jr. ripped it out from behind. North’s Dre Byrd recovered the fumble in the end zone, and Hall’s nightmare half was underway.
Ledford’s defense forced a punt, but Hall’s next pass attempt was picked out of the air by a leaping Byrd, who raced 36 yards from midfield to give the Cavalier offense a golden opportunity.
Again, Ledford’s defense held on downs, and again, Hall dropped back and this time threw to a wide open Leonard Atkins in the middle of the field. TheCavalier, stunned for a moment at his good fortune, took off for the end zone and made it to the 2. Miller’s easy QBsneak made it 19-14.
“He was pretty good, but the defense stayed solid,”Phillips said of Hall. “I think the big advantage was that they haven’t played anybody with our speed at the defensive backs.”
Phillips got the chance to show some more of that speed, and it couldn’t of come at a better time. After North fumbled away the ball on its own 21, Hall completed his final two passes of the night — with a minute left to play in the third quarter — on a 20-yard TD to Stan Smith. The two-point completion to Chase Adams made it 22-19 Ledford, a lead that lasted all of 15 seconds.
With all eyes on Miller, who’d been running up the middle the entire third quarter, Phillips grabbed a handoff on an end-around. He turned a modest gain of 9 yards into a big gain thanks to some broken tackles. He turned a big gain into a game-breaker after more missed tackles down the field. In all, Phillips raced 65 yards, with Kevin Rutherford’s PATstretching the lead to 26-22.
“That looked like we usually do,”said head coach Roger Secreast, who didn’t care if North scored in seven minutes or seven seconds. “A big play!”
Thanks in large part to some big guys, Phillips added.
“I give that all to JarrettWishon,”he said. “Good blocking. It lightened the defense up and everybody else just pulled together.”
TheCavs spent the entire fourth quarter working on the clock as Miller ran up the middle behind Wishon, Mack Ellis and Alex Gordon for 28 yards in the final period.
North took nearly five minutes off the clock before punting with 6:55 to go, then Phillips went to work again. With Ledford at midfield, Hall tried to hit Sam Cecil on the sideline, put Phillips shot in front and picked it off.
The Panthers got the ball back with 2:05 remaining, but pass breakups on four straight plays by Dominique Bates, Phillips and Byrd sealed the win. Hall’s final eight pass attempts of the night fell incomplete. He finished 10-for-23 with the three interceptions and only 125 yards.
After the turnover on downs, Miller took a knee on three downs to kill the clock. He finished with 12 carries in the fourth quarter, a game’s worth for any North runner.
“We knew we were up on them, so we were trying to kill the clock,” Wishon said. “The whole line stuck together.”
And Miller stuck behind it, letting theCavs ride the big men all the way to victory.
“I knew with Wishon, he told me he was ready to block,”Miller said. “Just point out which way to go.”
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