Admiral Farragut 42, Glades Day 16

By Chris Girandola

ST. PETERSBURG – In the first game I covered this season, I witnessed Admiral Farragut demolish Victory Christian, a perennial playoff team. I saw players like Rayshawn Jenkins, Cortavious Givens, Todd Macon, and Napoleon Maxwell showcase skills that would do more than fine on a larger public school stage.

At the beginning of the playoffs, I had a strong feeling that either Farragut or Canterbury would reach the state finals. Not because they were local teams. But because they had the proven ability and talent to do so.

On Friday, Glades Day entered the Class 2A state semifinals with a state record-holder at running back and several trips to the state finals in their bag.

Unfortunately, for the Gators, Admiral Farragut possessed too many weapons on offense and too much punch on defense.

Despite receiving 75 rushing yards and two touchdowns by Glades Day junior Kelvin Taylor, Jr., Glades Day could not keep up with the explosive offense of the Blue Jackets as it suffered a 42-16 loss in St. Petersburg. The win sends Admiral Farragut to the state title game for the first time in school history and gives Pinellas County a participant in the championship setting for the first time since 1995 when Dixie Hollins lost.

“We knew they had some good players and you just have to give credit to them,” said Taylor, who broke Emmitt Smith’s career rushing record of 8,804 yards with 210 yards in the first playoff game this season.. “They just loaded the box on me and they kept coming at me the whole game. They’re a great team and we just have to get back to work so we can see them again next season. And come away with a win the next time.”

Jenkins, who has orally committed to Miami, had a total of four touchdowns and had Glades Day’ players, coaches and fans gushing over him throughout the second half.

“I’ve had enough of that No. 3,” one fan bellowed at one point during the game. “Can someone pllllleeeeasse stop him.”

Jenkins rushed for 130 yards and three touchdowns. He also had a touchdown reception.

He also had a Florida assistant coach, who was on the Gators sideline to check out Taylor, commenting during the entire game how impressive he was.

Farragut turned a 21-14 lead at halftime into a runaway win when the Blue Jackets scored on three of its first four possessions.

After a 22-yard run by Todd Macon (18 carries, 89 yards) gave Admiral Farragut a 28-14 lead, the Gators seemed as if they would hang in the game when they drove all the way to the Blue Jackets two-yard line. But Taylor was stripped of the ball before crossing the goal line.

Glades Day stopped the Blue Jackets for a loss in the end zone for a safety, but on Farragut’s next possession, Rayshawn Jenkins ran untouched for a 48-yard touchdown to put the Blue Jackets up 35-16.

The Gators fumbled on the first play of their next series and Napoleon Maxwell (3 carries, 61 yards) scored on a 47-yard run to give the Blue Jackets a 42-16 lead.

More than anything, he, and not Taylor, was the best player on the field and “We mixed things up early and it forced them to play us honest throughout the game and that allowed us to break off those long runs in the second half,” said Jenkins, who had a one-yard quarterback sneak for a touchdown and a 11-yard reception for a score. “We knew they had (Taylor) and we had a game plan in place by our coaches to put pressure on him early and often.”

Besides a 59-yard run, a 12-yard run for a touchdown in the first half and a 24-yard run in the second half, Taylor was held to 13 rushes of three yards or less.

“Our defensive coaches did a great job in creating a scheme to stop him,” Blue Jackets coach Chris Miller said. “We had outside leverage on him and pressed him to the inside and except for a few runs, we made the tackles on him when we were engaged.”

The Blue Jackets dictated the tempo of the game early in the first half with a mixture of passes and runs that led to two scores in the second quarter. Perhaps the most significant play came on an incompletion in the first quarter when a deep pass down the middle of field by Colby Robinson was dropped by a wide-open Demetrius Lewis.

Miller called on Lewis soon after and the 6-3, 190-pound senior delivered with a 40-yard catch and run to set up Jenkins first score on a four-yard run.

Robinson looked sharp, completing 6-of-9 passes for 130 yards. Except for a tipped pass that landed in a Gators defender’s “look-what-I-found” hands, Robinson’s play proved how capable and dangerous the Blue Jackets can be.

The multi-pronged attack also was an example of what the Blue Jackets did all season against their competition in the Class 2A-5 district.

Jenkins said facing runners like Canterbury’s Brent O’Neal and Carrollwood Day’s Robert Davis gave them reason to believe the Blue Jackets could contain Taylor and beat the Gators.

“Those guys (O’Neal and Davis) are some of the best runners in the state, not just the area, and playing against them prepared us for what we would see in Taylor,” said Jenkins. “I think our district is the best in the state and we have talent up and down it and facing all that competition week in and week out was beneficial for us in the long run.”