Catholic rolls past Charles Henderson in Class 5A battle
Catholic defender Garrett Sanford grabs Henderson quarterback Kellen Stewart in the Knights’ win on Friday. (Ryan Gayle)
By TIM GAYLE
It really wasn’t fair.
Catholic rolled up a 28-6 lead at the half over Charles Henderson, then turned to its reserves to finish off the Trojans on Friday night.
The problem for the Trojans is the reserves were two of the best athletes on the team, with quarterback Kingston Preyear and tailback Josh Harriel putting their own stamp on the game and helping the Knights to a 63-6 win.
JJ Williams started his fifth game at quarterback this season, running for 62 yards and a pair of touchdowns on six carries while completing 7 of 13 passes for 71 yards. Starting tailback Giovanni Hayner rushed for 70 yards on 10 carries in the first half.
Preyear, the freshman who has played an increasing amount of snaps over the past three weeks as he recovers from a preseason injury, completed 6 of 7 passes for 110 yards and a pair of touchdowns. Harriel, the sophomore expected to start this season, was relegated to a backup role to learn a little more about the position while rushing for 79 yards and two touchdowns on six third-quarter carries.
“When you’ve got an O-line that good, it doesn’t matter who’s back there,” said Catholic senior offensive lineman Aaron Taylor. “That’s taking nothing away from those guys. Those guys are special, from Kingston to JJ, Gio, Josh, Zaylon (Jackson), all their skills are special. We have a real special offense this year. This was just a preview. There’s more to come.”
Charles Henderson (2-2) entered the game unbeaten in region play but would prefer not to see “more to come.” The Trojans managed 24 total yards in the first quarter and 57 for the remainder of the game, the bulk of that coming on one 34-yard throw against the Catholic reserves in the fourth quarter.
The Catholic offense, meanwhile, scored on nine of their first 10 possessions of the game, although one became a backward punt by Matthew Russo in which he attempted to kick a loose ball out of the back of the end zone, but only reached the end zone, resulting in a recovery and touchdown by Charles Henderson.
Three of Catholic’s seven touchdowns allowed have been special teams miscues. That and 10 penalties for 105 yards gave Catholic coach Kirk Johnson plenty to think about.
“I’m not happy with our penalties,” he said. “We get lackadaisical. I’m not happy with our special teams blemishes. We continue to allow things to affect us and we’ve got to be better. And we will be. If not, I’m going to fire myself.”
Certainly, the highlight was a defensive front that limited the Trojans to 14 yards on 28 rushing attempts. Seniors Garrett Sanford, with eight tackles and a sack, and Dylan Rogers, with five tackles and a sack, led the effort.
“We’ve got a pretty good group of guys on the D-line,” Sanford said. “We’ve all been playing for four years together. I have to give a shout-out to T.O., Trevon Orum, a rising sophomore that played his butt off tonight. He came out tonight and really showed himself.”
Defensive backs Rickie Williams (seven tackles and two pass breakups). Jo Pierce (five tackles) and Bryce Carter (four tackles and a 38-yard interception return for the game’s final touchdown) contributed to the dominating performance as well.
“While the box played really well, I’m proud of the back end, too,” Johnson said. “We made some plays back there, we caused some fumbles, we rallied to the football. And offensively, we had some explosive plays. What we can’t allow is any of those explosive plays to get called back, whether it’s a hold, a block in the back, whatever. When you’re playing deep in the playoffs, that’s going to bite you.”
Hayner’s hard running between the tackles was complimented well by Harriel’s slashing weave through the Trojan defense. Williams’ solid performance in directing the offense was complimented in the third quarter by Preyear’s smooth delivery against the Trojan secondary
“It feels good to know a young guy’s coming in and we can put JJ back at receiver,” Taylor said. “He doesn’t have to do anything special, just do his job and that’s what he did tonight.”
Preyear’s only incompletion was a pass over the middle that Williams hauled in on the way to the end zone, then dropped.
“He has to continue to get better,” Johnson said of his freshman quarterback. “He makes some boneheaded mistakes because he’s a freshman. He’s young and talented, but he’s young.”
With the win, Catholic (5-0) won its 20th consecutive game dating back to a loss to Andalusia in the 2022 semifinals as well as its 39th consecutive regular season game dating back to a loss to Montgomery Academy in 2020. It was also the Knights’ 36th consecutive region victory dating back to 2018.
Next week, the Knights travel to Saraland to face the Spartans (5-0), a team that reached the 6A finals before losing to Clay-Chalkville last December. The Spartans have won 16 straight regular season games and 32 of the last 33.
“You’ve got to forget about last year,” Sanford said. “Yeah, we won state last year but that doesn’t matter this year. Their (trip to the finals) really doesn’t matter, either. We’re just going to go in and play our hardest. We believe we can beat them.”
It’s a non-region game, but still one of the most anticipated matchups in school history.
“We approach it the same way we approach every week,” Taylor said. “It’s a bigger school, bigger team, but a game is a game, football is football. It’s the way you practice, the way you prepare, that determines who’s going to win.”