When the dust finally settled at Friday’s “Battle at the Boneyard,” the East Paulding Raiders emerged as the sole undefeated team on the field. East Paulding and the visiting Etowah Eagles provided the thousands of fans in attendance with a memorable game that had everything a high school football fan could ask for – especially in a matchup featuring two unbeaten teams in Region 5-AAAAA. Deep passes, powerful runs, bad penalties, costly turnovers, late comebacks, fourth-quarter heroics … you name it, it happened.
After a scoreless first quarter, the Raiders brought the hometown fans to their feet when quarterback Jesse Groover found wideout Ed Cazanave in the end zone for a 13-yard touchdown. And while Etowah running back Ryan Boykin appeared to set the Eagles up with a possible game-tying score (thanks in part to two runs of 15 and 18 yards), East Paulding’s Zach Gonosz picked off a pass in the end zone to secure the lead for the Raiders.
In the second half, a Boykin fumble gave East Paulding the ball on the 22-yard line and on the next play, the Groover-Cazavane connection struck again, with Cazavane making a spectacular grab in the corner of the end zone. The teams then traded interceptions, as East Paulding’s Awal Umaru’s pick was matched by Etowah’s Jordan Padgett, who also managed to snag an interception in the end zone. Still, the Eagles were held off the scoreboard, partly because of Gonosz’s key tackles throughout the quarter.
Etowah fans began to grow restless in the fourth quarter and luckily for them, the offense finally started to heat up. Boykin started things off with a 17-yard run, which set up a 3-yard touchdown run by quarterback James Harris. It seemed all but over when Gonosz collected his second interception shortly afterwards, but a huge tackle for loss by linebacker Ishmael White and costly delay-of-game penalties forced East Paulding to punt. With two minutes remaining, the Eagles moved downfield when Joey Gilkey caught a 29-yard pass. And though wide receiver Taylor Majors had been on the sidelines icing his leg minutes earlier, there he was back on the field, catching a 23-yard touchdown and tying the game at 14-14 with 1:36 remaining.
But while East Paulding’s offense had not had a quick drive the entire game, the Raiders found the perfect time to do so. After Etowah made the mistake of booting the kickoff out of bounds, runs of 20 yards and 8 yards by Ayman Hasan and an 11-yard run by Jahron Brown helped the Raiders get down to the 2-yard line. And with 15 seconds left, Stephen Cummins shook off the pressure, nailing a 19-yard field goal for the final score. Both teams started the game at 5-0, but it was East Paulding who stayed undefeated after a 17-14 victory.
No doubt about it, the gameball goes to Gonosz. Not only did he have two crucial interceptions but he was all over the field all game long, with several tackles for loss as well.
For now, East Paulding’s undefeated streak remains. But don’t hand the Raiders the Region 5-AAAAA title just yet: rivals Harrison beat Cherokee 48-6 tonight to improve to 6-0 as well, and the two teams meet on Oct. 17.
Arapoglou can be reached at tarapoglou@scoreatl.com.
Loading ...
