Friday, December 4, 2009

The Butler did it

I watched Butler's surprisingly easy 38-14 win over Independence Friday night from the sideline at Providence High and came away even more impressed with the Bulldogs. (Providence's awesome replay scoreboard made this easier, since you could see Butler dominate again on the video board after most plays).

In my column for Saturday's paper, I predict that Butler will end the season 15-0 in a week, beating Fayetteville Britt for the state championship on Dec.12. I haven't seen Britt play, but I've seen enough good high school teams to know that this Butler bunch is state-championship caliber and very focused.

Senior H-back Anthony Short caught two long TD passes Friday -- they have nicknamed him "PlayStation" for a reason. QB Christian LeMay was spectacular. But like all great football teams, Butler has a lot of depth. Junior H-back Deion Walker may be the Bulldogs' most underrated player -- he's fantastic, too. If I were kicking the ball deep to Walker and Short, I'd just as soon boot it out of bounds.

Butler was so good Friday night at answering challenges, too. The two times Independence scored TDs, in both cases Butler answered very quickly -- one time it only took 16 seconds (a long kickoff return and then a pass to Short). The other time, after Indy scored on the last play before halftime, Butler just took the second-half kickoff and needed only about 90 seconds to score.

The Bulldogs weren't a bit intimidated by the situation and I can't believe they will be next Saturday at 7:30 p.m. in Raleigh, when playing Britt at N.C. State's home (Carter-Finley Stadium). This is a team that is all grown up and deserves to win a state title. I believe it will.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Get a Clue Anonymous. Get it? A Clue? The Butler did it. Clue. Really.

Anonymous said...

Great job Bulldogs! Go make us even more prouod and bring home the championship!!

Anonymous said...

Indy had 550 yards of offense. Just couldn't score at the end of drives.

Anonymous said...

Just a flat out better team won the game any way you look at it!! Its too bad a dynasty had to die last night, with a trash talking, ego filled coach! Its not trash if you can back it up, he couldn't, he got bitch slapped! The new dynasty has been born!!

Jennifer said...

I watched my Firebirds lose 33-32 in Triple Overtime <:-(...
What a game...way to go SNSH....what a season...!!!

Anonymous said...

Word is Knotts was told to throw the game or else if he wanted the RRHS job next yr since Butler never been to the finals or won the big one and will have nothing next yr so its now or never. Nobody gets 550 yds of offense and loses unless its a fix.

Anonymous said...

Fayettevilles Jack Britt killed a tuff undefeated Wake Cty Wake Forest Rolesville.

Britt a badazz mutha and has everyone back. They romped RC last year in the finals but gave it away in the last minutes with stupidity and a lot of luck from the Raiders who been there done that about 50 times.

Two hongry teams on a mission. Who wins? The most lean and mean and hongry.

Britt by 14.