BY BRET STRELOW
SALISBURY POST

KANNAPOLIS — Northwest Cabarrus super-senior Shelton Roseboro finally got to finish off a drive.

West Rowan can hold Roseboro partly responsible if the Falcons’ season finishes up earlier than they had hoped.

Roseboro rushed for 162 yards and scored on a 6-yard run with 57 seconds left to lift the Trojans to a 28-24 upset of West Rowan on Friday night.

The Falcons dropped their second game in North Piedmont Conference play and now need to beat Mooresville next week to have any chance at making the playoffs.

“We don’t control our own destiny now,”said Falcon coach Scott Young, who watched his team drop to 5-4 overall and 2-2 in the NPC.

“Tonight with a win, we would have controlled our own destiny.”

Roseboro ruined that with his scamper into the end zone with less than a minute to play.

Northwest (4-6, 1-4 ) trailed 24-14 before quarterback Jacob Allman connected with Joe Godwin for a 46-yard touchdown with 7:39 left. Godwin finished the night with five catches for 111 yards.

“They’ve got a real good receiver, and we told our kids about that all week,” Young said. “He made a heck of a play, a spectacular catch. That momentum jumped back on their sideline.”

Allman and Godwin came up big on Northwest’s next drive after Scott Meseroll missed a 39-yard field goal with 3:43 left.

The Trojans marched from their own 20 to the West 30, and Godwin made a leaping catch in traffic to give Northwest a first-and-goal at the 6.

Roseboro capped off senior night in style one play later.

“As a senior, this is my last time on this home field,”Roseboro said. “It felt great to score the last touchdown to win this game. I had to pull it out for us seniors. I ended it right.”

West’s defense couldn’t stop Northwest in the final eight minutes, but it played a large part in helping the Falcons dig out of a 14-0 hole at halftime.

Fozzell Cuthbertson got West going with an interception at the Trojan 38 on Northwest’s fourth play from scrimmage in the second half.

Ben Hampton, who finished with 23 carries for 147 yards, scored on a 38-yard run two plays later to put the Falcons on the board.

Roseboro fumbled on the Trojans’ next play from scrimmage, and West defensive lineman Antuane Gray recovered to give the Falcons a first down at the Trojan 27. QB Gary Scott sprinted in from 5 yards out with 5:11 left in the quarter to tie the game.

Cuthbertson struck again on the Northwest’s next possession, intercepting a pass at the West 45 and returning it to the Trojan 8-yard line. Meseroll gave the Falcons their first lead with a 22-yard field goal with 1:09 left in the third quarter.

“I was just reading (Allman’s) eyes and backpedaling, doing what I was taught,” Cuthbertson said. “I just was there when it happened.”

Cuthbertson, who came to West from Durham Riverside, also broke up a pass in the second half. But he was stuck on the sidelines during the Trojans’ game-winning drive with what he thought was a concussion.

“I couldn’t remember anything, they had to take me out,”Cuthbertson said.

Said Young, “Him being new, just moving in, he’s a big part of our team. He got knocked a little silly there at the end, I wish he would have been on the field there at the end, it might have maybe made some more good things happen for us.”

Very few good things happened for West in the first half. Northwest controlled the clock and the line of scrimmage.

The Falcons got going on their first possession and moved all the way to the Trojan 4. But Hampton fumbled on first-and-goal, and Northwest’s Phillip Jackson raced 21 yards toward the other end of the field.

Northwest went on a 11-play, 75-yard drive, which included runs on the final 10 snaps. Roseboro rushed six times on the drive, but fullback Ken Kepley got the glory with a 3-yard scoring run.

Roseboro did the brunt of the work on the Trojans’ next scoring drive, a 12-play, 82-yard march. But again it was Kepley getting the last touch, this time from 1-yard out.

West Rowan trailed by two touchdowns at the break after having possession of the ball for only 7:17 in the first 24 minutes of action.

“(Coach Young)told us he thought we were playing scared, and we were,”Hampton said. “Everybody felt the pressure of this game, and we weren’t willing to step up and take it in the first half. Once he said that, in the second half, we got fired up.”

Hampton’s emotions had flip-flopped by game’s end. The stinging feeling from the loss was visible in his eyes and in his voice.

That didn’t stop the senior from following up Young’s post-game speech with a few words of his own. He urged his teammates to keep their heads up heading into next week’s crucial matchup with Mooresville.

“It’s hard work next week,”Hampton said. “The hardest week of preparation we’ve had all season. It’s the biggest game of the season for us.”

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NOTES: Hampton and Roseboro have competed against each other since they were in middle school, and Hampton had nothing but words of praise for his counterpart. “I’ve seen him on many college visits I went to, he’s been down there, he’s just a great athlete,”Hampton said. “I think we kind of took them too lightly tonight, that’s what great athletes do, they step up when they’re called on.”.. West senior Kendall High had two sacks...Scott finished the evening 3-of-9 passing for 36 yards, and LaGrande Andrews had 12 carries for 57 yards.

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Contact Bret Strelow at 704-797-4258 or bstrelow@salisburypost.com .