FOOTBALL

Football: South Brunswick tops Hillsborough in Central Group V

Greg Tufaro
Courier News and Home News Tribune

The first eight minutes of the South Brunswick High School football team’s impressive 42-7 victory over Hillsborough in a Central Group V first-round playoff on Friday night served as a microcosm of the entire game.

During that span, the Vikings established a solid pass rush and an air-tight secondary, forced two three-and-outs to win the field possession battle and scored on their first two possessions while building a 13-0 lead.

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“We thought we could move the ball on them, but we needed to stop them defensively,” South Brunswick head coach Joe Goerge said. “We knew they were a threat. We watched some games on them.”

What Goerge and his staff saw was a skilled quarterback in Matt Moore, a gifted receiver in Jackson Parham and a talented running back in Tyler Boatwright.

“I think the pass rush right off the bat helped us and the gang tackling was great,” Goerge said, noting that both elements of South Brunswick’s defense combined with stellar play from the secondary to negate Hillsborough’s potent attack. “They set the tone for what we did tonight.”

Second-seeded South Brunswick advanced to the sectional semifinals and will host third-seeded Old Bridge, a 24-6 winner over Trenton in another first-round game. 

The Vikings (8-1) won the initial meeting with Old Bridge 35-6 in the season opener for both schools, but the Knights (7-2) are a vastly improved team, having won their last six games including victories over defending sectional champions Piscataway and Sayreville.

Seventh-seeded Hillsborough (6-4) was outgained 351 to 135 in total yards from scrimmage with 66 of those yards coming against the second-string defense on the Raiders’ final drive, which Moore culminated with a 3-yard scoring run in the closing minutes.

South Brunswick's Jaylan Lawson catches a touchdown pass in the first half against Hillsborough in their Central Group V quarterfinal on Friday, Nov. 10, 2017.

Quarterback Felix Quinones, who was his usual brilliant self in guiding South Brunswick’s well-oiled triple option, rushed for 147 yards and two touchdowns on 15 carries. He closed out the Vikings’ scoring with runs of 44 and 34 yards in the third quarter. Quinones also completed 3 of 4 passes for 61 yards including a 29-yard touchdown pass to Jaylan Lawson.

Jayvon Palmer scored on runs of 4 and 1 yards in the final four minutes of the second quarter to help South Brunswick build a 27-0 halftime lead. Thomas Joe-Kamara set up Palmer’s second touchdown with a blocked punt that gave the Vikings excellent field position at the Hillsborough 31 yard line.

Trailing 13-0 early in the second quarter, Hillsborough mustered its only sustained drive against the first-team defense, marching from its 34 yard line to the South Brunswick 33 before turning the ball over on downs with an incomplete pass.

The drive featured a reverse which Parham ran for 14 yards and an 8-yard pass completion, which were Hillsborough’s biggest plays of the opening half. The only other play from scrimmage against the first-team defense that yielded more than 14 yards was an 18-yard run from Boatwright midway through the third quarter.

Hillsborough lost the services of one of its best two-way players, Charles Amankwaa, who left the game early in the first quarter after appearing to re-injure his ankle. The way South Brunswick was playing on defense, his presence likely would have had little impact.

“We worked all week to stop their passing game, and that’s exactly what we did,” said Quinones, who doubles as a defensive back. “Me and Justin (Shorter) worked all week reading how they run routes and how they go about their business and that’s all we had to do. The (pass deflections of which Quinones had three) were just based on hard work in the week.”

Moore completed 4 of 16 passes for 36 yards, 20 of which came on Hillsborough’s final drive. A stiff wind and temperatures in the low teens conspired along with South Brunswick’s well-prepared defense to hamper the Raiders’ passing attack.

“We repped their plays all week,” linebacker Dylan Kriz said. “They (the South Brunswick coaching staff) spent hours and hours on the weekend prepping and we came out here tonight and it was just like we were practicing.”

Kriz, who was South Brunswick’s second leading rusher with 51 yards on seven carries, helped the Vikings amass 290 yards on the ground. 

He was quick to credit offensive linemen Xavier Cargile, Zach Racanati, Kyle White, Mike Slover and Sean Goldsmith with South Brunswick’s success on the ground, which included a 3-yard touchdown run from Shorter, a Penn State University commit.

“They created holes,” Kriz said, “and we just hit it. We were working as one tonight.”