On Friday night, the football team crushed Central Dauphin East 43-17. Behind two touchdowns each from sophomore running back D’Antae Sheffey and junior receiver Michael Gaul, State High rebounded from a slow start to easily dismantle CD East.
CD East came out firing with a 68-yard touchdown run on their first possession of the game. State High’s offense had no answer and immediately sent the ball back with a punt.
The Panthers wasted no time driving down the field and kicked a 23-yard field goal with 7:54 to play in the first quarter. Suddenly, State High was down 10-0 less than five minutes into the game.
The Little Lion offense continued to struggle, but with 4:01 left in the first quarter disaster struck for CD East. The ball was snapped over the head of the punter and State High took over on downs at the CD East six-yard line. On third down, junior quarterback Eddie Corkery got State High on the board with a nine-yard touchdown pass to Gaul to make the score 10-7. The touchdown injected some life into the State College sideline, and it was all Little Lions from that point forward.
A promising State High drive came up short early in the second quarter, and senior kicker John Zipf, who has been nearly automatic so far this season came out for the field goal try. Zipf nailed the 32-yarder to even the score at 10 with 11:49 left in the half.
CD East’s offense fell into a rut as it went three and out to give the ball right back to State High. A 37-yard run from Sheffey brought the Little Lions into scoring position on the first play of the drive. Soon after, Corkery and Gaul connected again, this time from four yards out to give State High a 17-10 lead that they would never relinquish.
On the kickoff, State High fooled the CD East kick return team with an unexpected onside kick. Sophomore Ben Ruffner recovered for State High to give the offense a short field with 9:00 to play in the second quarter.
Explosive plays continued to be key for the State High offense, as Corkery hit junior receiver Ty Salazer for 30 yards to the CD East eight yard line. Three D’Antae Sheffey rushes later, State High had a 24-10 lead. However, the extra point from Zipf was 15 yards longer due to the first of many personal fouls. The unnecessary roughness call here was on Sheffey, and while it didn’t matter because Zipf made the kick, the team wants to limit personal fouls as much as possible.
State High and CD East combined for over five personal fouls and each team received a sideline warning.
Michael Gaul said, “Just like any other penalty you don’t want [personal fouls] to happen, but there were some cases where it was like, ‘what do you want us to do.’” In any case, tempers were running high and State High has to prevent these penalties in the future if it wants any chance of advancing through the playoffs.
Personal fouls did not impact the game here, as the State High offense continued to roll and the CD East offense couldn’t get anything going against the stifling Little Lion defense.
Corkery, Gaul and Sheffey continued their big nights with another touchdown, an interception, and a 26-yard rushing touchdown, respectively. Sophomore Daimear Coad also continued his deep ball dominance with a 45-yard touchdown late in the third quarter to go up 37-10.
Disaster nearly struck two different times for State High with the game already in hand, when Corkery and senior lineman Justin Castro-Dixon each went down with an injury on separate possessions. Coming off the field, Castro-Dixon said to his teammates, “I’m straight, I can’t feel my foot though!” That appeared to not be an issue, as Dixon was back on the field one possession after he went down. Corkery only missed one snap.
With a final score of 43-17, many of the players got extra satisfaction out of this homecoming win over a familiar opponent.
“As much as you want to keep every win the same, this one does have a little something extra. [CD East] was playing a different kind of way that we didn’t really appreciate, and we’ll definitely remember that for next time,” Gaul said.
The Little Lions (4-1) are back in action next Friday on the road against Carlisle looking to remain undefeated in league play.
