The Reidsville Rams are back in the state semifinals.
Standing in between them and a shot at their twenty-fourth ever state championship are the West Craven Eagles, who will be traveling over two hundred miles northwest for this playoff battle at Community Stadium.
Quarterback DJ Davis leads the offense for West Craven. Though he completes only fifty-five percent of his throws, he has passed for 2088 yards and twenty-seven touchdowns. He has been picked off ten times. The problem for Reidsville is that Davis is a dual-threat QB, who has carried the ball 182 times for 1301 ground yards and a staggering twenty-six rush touchdowns. He accounts for nearly half of the team’s rush yards.
Christopher Person, Jr., Xavier Cuthbertson, and Terrell Dixon have all rushed for between three hundred and five hundred yards. Players not named DJ Davis, though, have only accounted for ten rush touchdowns.
The favorite targets of DJ Davis for those 2000 pass yards include the aforementioned Cuthbertson, for 42 receptions, 960 receiving yards, and 9 receiving touchdowns. Jeremiah Leigh has caught 30 passes for 660 yards and 12 touchdowns. Antwain Jones is the only other receiver with triple-figures receiving yards.
The defense has put up an unbelievable number of sacks. Emmanuel Miller and Kadyn Seamster have combined for 26.5 sacks. Eleven players have registered at least one sack, and the team as a whole has registered 51.5 sacks. They have given up less than sixteen points per game, and less than eleven in the playoffs. That is more impressive considering they received a bye week in the first round, so numbers against a 31 seed did not boost those defensive numbers.
Reidsville’s offense is much more spread out in the stat sheet than West Craven. Tyson Broadway is the newcomer who worked his way up to QB1 and put up six pass touchdowns last week, but Reidsville integrates other QBs as well.
Twenty different players have carried the ball, ten of which have scored rushing touchdowns. Michael Smith and Keyshawn Henry have led the way, while do-it-all man Dionte Neal has put up some impressive rush numbers as well. There is a plethora of rushers that can be put in the backfield whose abilities Reidsville fans are confident in.
They also distribute it well in the pass game, literally. Eighteen players have caught a pass and eight players have caught a six-point pass. But in this area, they are top heavy in that Kendre Harrison, Oregon-committed tight end, is approaching 1000 receiving yards this year and broke the record for most receiving touchdowns in Reidsville history last week, and Dionte Neal has eclipsed 1000 receiving yards this year and has added 18 touchdowns. No other receivers wearing navy and gold have even received half of Kendre or Dionte’s yards or one-fourth of Kendre or Dionte’s touchdowns.
Defensively, Reidsville is a sack machine like West Craven, with 41 total sacks. They are led by Kadence Pruitt with 10.5 and Zayliyn Hampton with 9. Turnovers-wise, Reidsville has forced slightly more than West Craven.
The numbers are close, and therefore, this has all of the makings of an exceptional ballgame. Reidsville defends their home territory against a worthy opponent in a 1-2 matchup for a spot in the title. But to add to the already high stakes, two Reidsville legends by the names of Kendre Harrison and Dionte Neal will be playing in their last game on Jimmy Teague Field, and they will certainly want to exit with a W.
It all takes place tomorrow, a day earlier than expected due to a possibility of poor weather on Friday. The winner advances to the championship game next Thursday to face the winner of 1 Brevard and 6 Maiden, in a game that will take place on Friday to determine the 4A West representative.
Unfortunately, it does not look like I will be able to provide live updates throughout the game tomorrow. However, stay tuned on GreensboroSports.com for the Rockingham County Review immediately afterwards to see if the Rams’ season continues.