JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – It was tough to tell if Raines had won a state semifinal Friday night or if the Vikings had just taken care of business in some regular season game.
Compared to last season’s semifinal, when there was a sense of excitement at getting a crack at the Class 3A state title, this final four felt like another step on the ladder.
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There were no screams of excitement, little jumping up and down but a definite sense of belonging at this level after Raines throttled Sarasota Booker 28-8 in the Varsity 4 Game of the Week, stifling a team that had averaged more than 40 points a game.
Last season, the semifinal against Booker came down to the wire and the Vikings (13-0) celebrated a trip to play for the state title. This season, Raines, Region 1-3A champions and the second seed in the state, methodically dismantled the Region 3-3A champion Tornadoes (12-2).
Afterward, the Vikings celebrated just like they had when they methodically dismantled the other 12 teams on their schedule, with nine of those being running-clock walkovers.
They knew they belonged in the title game. After finishing last season as runner-up for the third time in school history, business is not over.
“It’s a great feeling, but I’m not happy, I’m not satisfied, until we win it all,” said senior linebacker Tony Williams, whose jarring hit and forced fumble on the opening kickoff of the second half set the tone for the final 24 minutes. “Last year, I felt like we celebrated too much after winning this game. We got too satisfied. This year, I don’t want celebrating until we win it all.
“When you do something once, then you do it again, you’re mainly focused on the mission ahead. Last year, it was kind of surreal that we made it. Now, making it and getting revenge is our main goal.”
Raines will look to next Friday to claim state title No. 4, alongside 1997, 2017 and 2018. The Vikings will see the team that denied them last season — top-seed Miami Northwestern (13-0), a 52-21 semifinal winner over Orlando Bishop Moore. That meeting will take place at Miami’s Pitbull Stadium at 7:30 p.m.
Win that, gain some revenge and then there will be something to celebrate.
“We worked hard all spring, all summer to get here,” said senior defensive end Makhel Smith-York, whose third quarter interception off a Chenaniah Doran tipped pass was only the third pick thrown by Booker quarterbacks this season. “We’ve got to go down there and get get-back.”
The Vikings like their chances, especially if they handle things the way they did with the Tornadoes, with no turnovers on offense and pressure against the Booker defense.
“We saw the mistake we made last year,” said senior quarterback TJ Cole, who threw for 120 yards and a touchdown. “We stick to our gameplan this season, and we can do whatever we want to do. We executed. We played a solid game. We wanted to go tempo. We wanted to play smart. We wanted to limit turnovers. We wanted to play Raines football.”
Raines football also involves a defense that pitched five shutouts this season. By the time the Tornadoes scored with 1 minute, 26 seconds left, many Vikings fans were planning their Miami itineraries.
That’s because the Raines defense was all over Booker, which had three three-and-out possessions and was stopped on fourth down four times.
This was a different Tornadoes team than last season, one that had a new head coach, new quarterback, had lost two 1,000-yard rushers and a 1,000-yard receiver. Still, they were averaging 363 total yards a game.
That is, until Friday, when Booker was held to 144 total yards, with 34 coming on the final drive.
There were tone-setters all over the Vikings defense. Williams leveling the return man to force a fumble that Raines recovered to start the second half. Safety Jucoby Marion laying out a receiver. Tornadoes backup quarterback Dylan Wester, a Pitt signee and receiver by trade, getting blasted by seemingly the entire defensive line on a run play.
“At halftime, we had to get some momentum and put the game away,” Williams said. “I told my homeboys I’m going to hit somebody.”
It was infectious. Even the offense got in on the act, with Ta’darius Washington blowing up a Booker defender on his way to a first down. On the next play Washington scored the Vikings’ final touchdown.
That’s Raines football. That’s tradition passed down from Harold Carmichael, Kenny Burrough, the Gaffneys, Brian Dawkins and Lito Sheppard, many of the names coach Donovan Masline said he referenced in his pregame talk.
Yes, it’s a Raines thing when giving up 23 points — the amount allowed in last season’s victory over Booker — still is a point of contention 364 days later.
”Last year, we corrected the mistakes from last year in giving up the 23 points,” said Williams, who signed with Illinois this week. “It was mistakes on us. We fixed the mistakes, kept drilling it, drilling it, repetition.”
Only two Booker rushing attempts went for more than five yards. Ten went for losses.
That was not an issue for the Vikings offense, which churned out a score on the game’s first drive, using 10 plays and aided by a fourth-down penalty on Booker, before Tisean Haynes crashed in from the 2.
“It was really important,” Cole said. “We wanted to score early. We knew they had to show that they could respond for the 24 minutes in the half and the 24 minutes in the second half.”
Raines repeated on its next drive, using nine plays and converting third downs along the way as Haynes drove in from the 1 for a 14-0 lead less than three minutes into the second quarter.
The big play capability showed on the third drive, when Cole found Ziyon Butler on a mid-range pass, and Butler juked out a defender and raced for a 65-yard score and 21-0 lead.
“I don’t let nobody guard me in press,” Butler said. “I’m a game-changer. That one right there changed the game.”
It did, and when Williams set the agenda in the second half, little was in doubt. The Vikings started the first four drives of the final half in Booker territory and, though they scored only one of those times, it was a tribute to how the defense had shut down the Tornadoes.
All that was left was the celebrating. Actually, that’s still what is left to do.
“That’s the main thing, everybody locked in on the goal ahead,” Williams said. “Like I said, we’re not satisfied until we win it all.”
Raines 28, Booker 8
Booker, 0, 0, 0, 8 — 8
Raines, 7, 14, 7, 0 —28
R – Tisean Haynes 2 run (Dan Duong kick)
R – Haynes 1 run (Duong kick)
R – Ziyon Butler 65 pass from TJ Cole (Duong kick)
R – Ta’darius Washington 3 run (Duong kick)
B – Dylan Wester 4 run (Chauncey Kennon pass from Maleek Lee)
Category: B -- R
First downs: 10 -- 16
Rushes-yards: 24-25 -- 45-64
Passing: 119 -- 124
Comp-Att-Int: 8-27-1 -- 8-15-0
Fumbles-lost: 2-1 -- 0-0
Penalties-Yards: 16-149 -- 15-146
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
RUSHING — B: Tyren Hornes 4-14, Wester 5-14, Kevontay Hugan 2-9, Mike Peterson 1-4, Jacoby Mobley 3-4, Mylin Brown 3-3, Kobran Waters 2-(-4), Joel Morris 4-(-19). R: Washington 16-46, Haynes 11-20, Ethan Sherman 1-11, Kelvin Brown 1-2, Cole 12-(-3), Team 3-(-4), Eddie Hinton 1-(-8).
PASSING — B: Morris 8-22-1-94, Wester 1-5-0-25. R: Cole 7-14-0-120, Sa’mon Ellison-Morgan 1-1-0-4.
RECEIVING — B: Waters 2-31, Hornes 2-27, Jayvian Hoffman 1-25, Wester 4-20, Mobley 1-16. R: Butler 2-80, Sherman 3-19, Brown 1-14, Washinton 1-7, Devin Frazier 1-4.