By Bob Sutton
Special to The Alamance News
The Williams football team had an ideal combination working in rainy conditions: A swarming defense and a dominating rushing attack.
The Bulldogs used those well to dispatch visiting Orange 47-23 in a Central 3-A Conference game Thursday night at Burlington Memorial Stadium.
Amarion Richmond rushed for 229 yards and finished with four total touchdowns.
And the Williams defense was on the spot to help compensate for the Bulldogs’ four turnovers.
“It’s important to make sure we got their back,” linebacker Nathan Williams-Medley said. “Defense has been locking in.”
The Bulldogs (5-1 overall, 2-0 Central 3-A Conference) held Orange (1-5, 0-2) to 45 yards of total offense through the Panthers’ first three possessions of the third quarter.
“Our defense did a good job controlling the line of scrimmage,” Williams coach Patrick Stokes said.
That group had good support behind them. Leontae Turner and Devon Joseph made interceptions.
“We were executing really well,” safety Vince Coker said. “The wet conditions really played into our favor.”
The game was moved up one night because of weather-related concerns, but rain fell throughout most of the game.
“I challenged our guys in spite of the elements, let’s be as efficient as possible,” Stokes said.
Richmond apparently was paying attention. He had touchdown bursts of 17, 27, and 68 yards on the ground to go with a 21-yard touchdown reception.
“The O-line gave me the best looks I could possibly get,” Richmond said. “We kept the motor going.”
Richmond, who carried the ball 22 times, had help in the backfield from Kris Rogers, who racked up 153 yards on 11 attempts with touchdown runs of 46 and 26 yards. The duo took turns dashing through the Orange front.
“The O-line takes a lot of pride in doing it the right way,” Stokes said.
Quarterback Dan Mahan had a 41-yard run for the Bulldogs’ second touchdown and completed 10 of 15 passes for 112 yards with two interceptions. His touchdown pass to Richmond came as the Bulldogs built a 20-3 lead late in the first quarter.
Williams’ defense kept things in order until the Bulldogs got rolling again in the second half.
“We try our best to back them up,” Coker said.
Williams gave up the ball on the game’s first snap, with Orange recovering a fumble. The Panthers barely moved, but went ahead on Will Cooper’s 28-yard field goal.
Trailing 27-3 and later 40-10, Orange found some offense. Kingston Purefoy-Farrington caught three touchdown passes on plays that covered 41, 75 and 70 yards.
Southern Alamance 55, Cedar Ridge 0: At Hillsborough, C.J. McAdoo’s 91-yard kickoff return for a touchdown to begin the game set the tone and Justin Donley ran for four touchdowns as the visiting Patriots rolled in the Central 3-A Conference game.
Southern (3-3, 1-1) notched its second shutout of the season.
It was 14-0 after the Patriots’ first snap, with Donley running 19 yards for a touchdown.
Donley added scoring runs from 16 and 18 yards, Nathan McNeal scored on a 2-yard run, and a safety helped Southern to a 34-0 edge through the first quarter. Donley, who finished with 84 rushing yards, had a 9-yard TD run in the second quarter.
A running clock was used in the second half as Cedar Ridge fell to 0-6, 0-2. Sincere Thompson scored on a 20-yard run and Drayden Brewer returned an interception 30 yards for Southern’s final touchdowns.
Moved to Monday
Eastern Alamance’s game at Western Alamance has had numerous dates, and now it appears the teams will meet at 7:00 p.m. Monday.
Like many other games in the region, the Eastern/Western game was shifted from Friday night to Thursday night. Then Western announced Friday that the game would go back to its original Friday date, but that was before the Alamance-Burlington School System called off all classes and activities for Friday because of weather-related concerns. Then came an announcement that the game will be contested Monday.
Graham’s game at Cummings already had been moved to Monday night after the death earlier this week of Cummings team member Malik Mebane.
