Friday night October 15:
Northern Guilford(7-0/4-0) at Page(4-3/4-0)
Looks like a good one here…The hard running of Hester(Trevon) from Page and the swarming defense from Northern Guilford…What wins out here??? Hester with 719 yards rushing and 15 rushing TD’s on the season, and Northern with Gooch, Underwood, Lachesky, Peters, Garfola, Flippen and the NG DB’s chasing him, and looking to bring him(Hester) down/slow him down..Not sure if NG has faced a back like Hester this year, but some of the Nighthawks might have been trying to tackle Hester, back when he was at Northeast Guilford in his sophomore year, and both NG and NEG were in the Mid-State 3-A Conference…The NG DB’s can cheat up, for they feel Hester will be getting the ball at least 70% of the time in this contest…If Hester is having a great game, he will see even more carries…If Northern is getting a good grip on Hester, Page may have to look more to Grady Sherrill and Jerron Blackwell, and ask them to become playmakers, in the form of recipients of Nick Williamson passes, or on jet sweep runs…Northern has a loaded/potent offense, with QB Jack Mercer, RB Jordan McInnis, and WR’s Manny Elliot, Zion Crawford, Jorden Geddy, Terrell Timmons(if back from ankle injury), and TE Vance Bolyard…The best defense for Page, may be keeping the NG offense off of the field…Page wants to keep their offense on the field, all night long if possible…This may be one of those rare nights that if you win the coin toss, you may want to go ahead and take the football to begin the game…Ball control with the ball in your possession…One of the strange things with Trevon Hester from Page is, I don’t see where he has caught a single pass for Page this season, and if it were me, I might even look to get him the ball with a short pass on the move out of the backfield in this game…But again, if Hester’s running is working, you don’t change anything, you just get him the ball…The Page O-lineman are going to have work hard to stay on their blocks…The NG D-lineman are not big, but they are very quick and athletic, and they know how to shed blockers in a hurry…
NG offense with QB Jack Mercer 1,237 yards passing on the season, good for 23 TD’S/5 INT’s…Mercer had a very good ground game going vs. Northwest Guilford, going for over 100 yards and he had two rushing TD’s…NG might want to get their PRO going…That would be a Pass/Run Option…Jordan McInnis has rushed for 847 yards on the year, and they came on 95 carries, with 10 TD’s…You don’t really believe it till you see it, but McInnis has more rushing yards this season than Hester from Page…Mercer has the solid corp of receivers and if Timmons is back they are even more solid…Game will be on GreensboroSports Radio, as this is our Murphy Wainer Orthopedic Specialists Game of the Week…Sprinkle Oil pregame at 6:50pm on GreensboroSports Radio, and the SayYes Guilford kickoff is due from Marion Kirby Stadium at 7:30pm on GreensboroSports Radio…
(For a distant rewind in this Page-Northern Guilford series from over the years, I still remember back in 2011, ten years ago, when Page defeated NG in the first game of the season, in early August, and Page went on to finish (15-0) winning the NCHSAA 4-AA Title over the Garner Trojans…Northern lost that first game in 2011 to the Pirates, and never lost again that season, topping the Crest Chargers, in the NCHSAA 3-AA Championship Game, and ending up [14-1] for 2021.)
**********Not sure where he is going to be, but we will be watching out for Joe Sirera, out there somewhere in coverage tonight, for the News and Record/HSXtra.com…Dave Polaski and Drew Brackett also out there in coverage for WSJS 600AM…**********
Grimsley(7-0/4-0) at Southwest Guilford(3-4/1-3)
With Grimsley QB Alonza Barnett III now at 103-167 passing for the season, with 24 TD’s and just one interception, plus Barnett with 47 carries for 324 yards and five more TD’s, how do you temper that type of production??? I’m not sure you can…..Then you add in Jeiel Melton with 676 yards rushing with 7 TD’s and Melton adds in 228 yards receiving, how do you overcome that type of productivity??? Southwest Guilford saw it in the JV game on Thursday night, and I have a suspicious feeling that they will be seeing it again this evening…Grimsley has receivers backing up receivers and when you add in the Whirlies defense, which is only giving up 11 points per game, and their offense is averaging 58 points a game, over the last three weeks…SWG has some real quick kids, but they are going to have their hands full trying to keep up with the Whirlies…Joey McInnis IV(SWG QB), vs. Alonza Barnett III, and you may have to call in Henry VIII to settle this one..
Ragsdale(1-6/0-4) at Northwest Guilford(3-4/1-3)
Northwest just wants to get back to what they were doing early in the season, and that would be winning…NWG has faced and come up short the last three weeks, falling to Grimsley, Page and Northern Guilford…Now NWG must play and finish with their best football of the season vs. Ragsdale, Southeast Guilford and Southwest Guilford…Ragsdale has not won since back in Week One, and the Tigers are on the way back, but they are still a very long way off from the finish line, and it will take the Tigers a while, to get back into the “W” column…
Western Guilford(1-5/0-4) at Southeast Guilford(4-3/2-2)
Should be Southeast Guilford by a bundle in this one, and you might say maybe not, since WG won the JV game last night, but we don’t see lightning striking two times in the same zip code in the same week…Elijah Davis with four TD’s last week for SEG, and maybe this week you run him like Archie Griffin and then you bring in Alex McCalop and let him score the short run touchdowns, like Pete Johnson did for Ohio State, back when Archie ran the ball between the 20’s, and then Pete would score the TD’s from inside the 10-yard line…Davis and McCalop, Griffin and Johnson, maybe the pattern is coming back…
Eastern Guilford(5-1/4-0) at Southern Guilford(3-4/2-2)
After falling to Smith, Southern is in a tight spot right now and the Storm are very vulnerable in their current state…Eastern with their QB Boyd and RB Evans and receiver Lundy can come in here and control this ball game if the Wildcats get off to a solid start…SG has a steady QB, they have steady RB’s, but the SG RB’s are also heavily relied upon to help the defense, do SG is overworked at the key positions..SG does not have a steady receiving corp working for them right now…EG has been rolling and that should continue until they meet the Dudley Panthers…
Dudley(6-1/4-0) at Rockingham County(3-2/2-1)
Speak of the devil, no speak of the Panthers….In four previous conference games, Dudley has out-scored the opposition, 252-6…That number again is 252-6 Dudley…Rockingham County will provide much tougher opposition than Dudley has seen in their other four conference games, but then again, for Dudley, one of the hardest/toughest things about this game will be finding The ROCK…It is sort off of off the beaten path…But once Dudley gets there, the Panthers should be ready to roll with Slade, Baker, Wall, Shaw, and others on offense, and Dudley has a defense that The ROCK has not seen the likes of, except maybe in their dreams/nightmares…
Smith(2-5/1-3) at High Point Central(2-4/1-2)
Smith has some names that we can now be looking for in QB Jaiden Carr, WR Darius Cross, WR CJ Neely, ATH Jamarri Coles, LB Ronnie Crump, QB/WR Dequaceion Ceasar and DB Ty’Wan Suggs among others…Central has their sophomore RB Zion McKoy, who rushed for over 240 yards last week…Both of these teams are starting to find their identities, and the team that wins this game will have three wins on the season, and that would be huge for both of these programs…
Northeast Guilford(0-7/0-4) at WS Atkins(1-5/1-3)
This could be the night that the NEG Rams find that elusive win that they have been searching so hard for…Let’s hope so, for Guilford County’s sake…
Morehead(1-6/0-3) at High Point Andrews(1-6/0-4)
The Morehead JV’s have won three games this season, and that might mean things are looking up for the Panthers…Things have to be looking up soon for Andrews..This has been a long and tough season…Not sure who pulls this game out, but let’s again put our faith in the Guilford County Eleven…
High Point Christian Academy(3-3/0-1) at Metrolina(6-1) 7pm
Thought HPCA had a chance last week vs. Concord/Cabarrus, but we don’t see if happening this week vs. Metrolina…Metrolina looks to be way too tough for the Cougars…We will know more after the dust settles in this contest from down near Charlotte…
Picks:
Northern Guilford
Grimsley
Northwest Guilford
Southeast Guilford
Eastern Guilford
Dudley
Smith
Northeast Guilford
High Point Andrews
Metrolina
Top Ten Poll
1)Grimsley(7-0)
2)Northern Guilford(7-0)
3)Dudley(6-1)
4)Page(4-3)
5)Eastern Guilford(5-1)
6)Southeast Guilford(4-3)
7)Northwest Guilford(3-4)
8)Southwest Guilford(3-4)
9)TIE:Smith(2-5)/High Point Central(2-5)