varsity.roanoke.com

FOREST — Don’t expect Jefferson Forest football coach Don Rice to return that RSVP for a Northside High School reunion in the near future.

Rice, Northside class of 1983, was treated rudely by his old school Friday night as the Vikings scored a resounding 28-6 victory over Forest in the 2009 season opener for both teams.

With JF ranked No. 4 in Timesland, Rice showed up for the party with a shiny new convertible. He left with a cheap suit and a bad comb-over.

“Being a Northside grad, I hate to see them do this to us, but I’m happy to see what Northside’s got going on,” Rice said.

So was everyone wearing green and white.

Northside, ranked No. 6, pulverized the Cavaliers at the line of scrimmage on both sides, blowing out to a 21-0 halftime lead and outrushing the hosts 335-25 overall.

“This definitely was a statement game,” Northside senior wingback Dustin Phelps said.

Phelps was a big part of a ground attack that took advantage of a dominant performance by the Vikings’ offensive line, particularly on the right side.

Senior back Philip Scott, playing in his first game since 2007, rushed for 159 yards and two touchdowns on 23 carries before leaving in the third quarter because of cramps.

Scott’s TD runs of 3 and 5 yards in the second quarter put Northside up 14-0, then Phelps applied the back-breaker with 49 seconds left in the opening half when he shook loose from a pile of tacklers and streaked 54 yards for a 21-0 lead.

How many tackles did he break?

“I’d say about five or six,” Phelps said. “I just kept my feet moving. The coaches say keep your feet moving and good things will happen.”
Nothing went right for JF in the first half.

The Cavaliers failed to recover a bobble by Scott on the opening kickoff. They doomed their first drive with two motion penalties. They had a pass interference call that nullified an interception. They were offside on a missed Northside field goal, leading to Scott’s second TD. They wasted a timeout because they had 10 men on the field on the ensuing kickoff. Once the 11th man came on, they failed to field the kickoff and the ball rolled into the end zone.

“There’s some adjectives I’d like to use, but I won’t use them now,” Rice said. “We had two really good scrimmages. I’m not sure we didn’t come out thinking we were going to walk out here because it was our field and they were going to quit.

“We didn’t give our offense a chance to get in the game. Our defense was on the field the entire time.”

Northside’s offense didn’t stop even when Scott and Phelps departed. Sophomore Blair Johnson had 61 yards on 19 second-half carries thanks to strong blocking. Quarterback Ryan Keith added the other TD on a 1-yard run with 3:40 to play.

“A lot of people talk about the speed, but we feel like we’re as physical as anybody,” Northside coach Burt Torrence said.

The Vikings loaded up an unbalanced line with massive Cameron Clark (6-4, 352) and Marque Johnson (5-10, 290) paving the way.

“Once we got the big boys in there, they weren’t stopping us,” two-way senior star Nick Sigmon said. “I don’t think they knew how to line up to it."

Jefferson Forest had one chance to get back in the game after Rashad Hall took a screen pass from Hunter Hannell and turned it into a 78-yard TD with 7:27 left in the third quarter. The Cavaliers got the ball back, but Sigmon threw Hall for a loss on the first play.

Sophomore Adam Hardister had a key interception that led to a TD. Brenton Gilliard and Keith also had picks.

Northside    0    21    0    7—28
Jefferson Forest    0    0    6    0—6
N — Scott 3 run (kick failed)
N — Scott 5 run (Scott run)
N — Phelps 54 run (Joyner kick)
JF — Hall 78 pass from Hannell (kick failed)
N — Keith 1 run (Joyner kick)
    NO    JF
First downs    19    4
Yards rushing    61-335    17-25
Passes C-A-I    0-8-1    6-16-3
Yards passing    0    146
Penalties-yards    4-35    4-29
Fumbles-lost    0-0    0-0
Punts-average    4-23    5-30
Individual statistics
RUSHING — Northside, Scott 23-159, Phelps 7-65, B.Johnson 19-61, Keith 6-35, Tanks 3-25, Penn-Timity 1-(-3), Team 2-(-7). Jefferson Forest, Hall 13-33, Hannell 2-1, Jones 2-(-9).
PASSING — Northside, Keith 0-8-1-0. Jefferson Forest, Hannell 6-16-3-146.
RECEIVING — Jefferson Forest, Jones 3-29, Hall 2-109, Rhodes 1-8.