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Nearly 400 days have passed since FRA went to CPA and stunned the Lions on their home field with a one-point victory. That year has passed but not a single player on CPA’s roster has forgotten that night and the feeling that loss left.
FRA traveled back to CPA on Friday night many expected a rematch of last year’s high-scoring affair. That’s not what happened though.
Led by a defense that forced five turnovers and a punishing ground game, CPA got its revenge against the Panthers with a 24-7 win.
“This is just great,” CPA senior linebacker and North Carolina commitment Crews Law said after the game. “We’ve been thinking about loss all week. We lost a game we weren’t supposed to lose so we knew we had to prepare differently.
…in the first half we didn’t come out the way we practiced. We fixed up in the second half, played pretty good but we’re nowhere near playing as good as we can. I think everyone is going to see us peak in the playoffs here in a few weeks where we look like a completely different team.”
Law’s assessment of the first half was fairly spot on. The Lions took nearly six minutes off of the clock on its opening drive but missed a field goal attempts. FRA responded with a five-minute drive that culminated in a short Ty Clark touchdown run.
CPA instantly responded with a 55-yard touchdown run by Rhule Patterson to tie things up. That was end of any successful offense in the first half. Between a plethora of penalty flags, turnovers and missed field goals, it became clear that a repeat of last year was nowhere in the books.
CPA did what it does best in the second half
Early on in the second half it seemed like FRA would be the first to finally break the scoreless deadlock that had plagued both teams since the first quarter.
The Panthers found themselves on the plus-side of the 50 on each of its first three drives in the half but had no success in the scoring department. Meanwhile, CPA found itself in Jackson Matthews.
Thanks to an interception and long return by the Tennessee commitment, CPA finally got back on the scoreboard with six seconds remaining in the third quarter on a short field goal. Those two plays ultimately broke the door open for the Lions.
Following another FRA interception, CPA began to push the ball behind the duo of Law and Patterson. On a misdirection play between the two, Patterson took the hand off finding a wide-open hole and scoring from 33 yards with 9:16 remaining.
Law put the game away on CPA’s next drive. Keeping it himself and bouncing off a few would-be tacklers, Law rumbled into the end zone cementing the win.
“In the second half we knew that we decided to run the ball a lotmore,” CPA senior offensive lineman and Ole Miss commitment John Wayne Oliver said. “We knew that they were tiring down because that they had a lot of guys playing both ways. We were more physically than they were and they couldn’t hold up with us.
…this feels great but the job’s not done. We’ll probably play them again in the playoffs and I believe that we’re the top two teams in DII-AA.”
