It’s good to be the king

Overton helps Springbrook to upset win over Whitman

Wednesday, Oct. 26, 2005

Click here to enlarge this photo Laurie DeWitt⁄The Gazette Springbrook’s Adou Kouadio returns a punt Saturday during the Blue Devils’ 14-7 win over Whitman on homecoming. Kouadio scored the winning touchdown in the fourth quarter.

‘‘It was a big win,” he said. ‘‘I liked our intensity during the whole game, and teams better know that they need to come in here and take us seriously. They need to keep playing tough or they’re going to [lose]. I’m glad we came out with a W.”

As the game started, it did not seem that Springbrook (4-3 overall, 1-2 in the county’s 4A East Division) was prepared to take on a team of Whitman’s caliber. The early part of the season had been especially brutal for the Vikings, as they lost to Damascus, Gaithersburg and Quince Orchard (teams with a combined record of 18-3), but wins against Northwest and B-CC had evened their record and brought them back into the playoff picture. As Whitman (3-4 overall, 2-2 in the county’s 4A West Division) opened the game with the ball on its own 36-yard line, it seemed poised to continue its upward trend. Quarterback Greg Kingscott’s first pass attempt was an incompletion, but he connected on his next four throws, while junior running back Pat Lazear steadily gained chunks of yards on four carries. In the course of 6 minutes and 39 seconds, Whitman dissected the Blue Devils’ defense, and with just over five minutes remaining in the quarter, Lazear plunged into the end zone from a yard out to give the Vikings a 7-0 lead.

Rather than panic, Springbrook answered right back. Starting on their own 26-yard line, the Blue Devils followed Whitman’s blueprint, mixing passes with running plays to march down the field. Brantley hit junior receiver Ben Simmons for a 28-yard gain in the middle of the drive, but Overton (55 yards on 15 carries as well as three catches for 32 yards during the game) was the catalyst. He caught passes out of the backfield and used short, choppy steps on rushing plays to gain footing on the muddy field. On his fifth carry of the drive he broke through two attempted tackles at the line of scrimmage and sprinted 23 yards for a touchdown. Though Lazear blocked the extra point to preserve Whitman’s lead the momentum had shifted considerably.

‘‘I think at that point the guys realized that they could play with [Whitman],” Springbrook head coach Rob Wendel said. ‘‘We went into the half trailing, but it should have been 7-7. We just made some adjustments to stay a step ahead of them.”

As the soggy field continued to deteriorate under the cleats of players on both sides, so did the precision of the play. After starting so well on the opening drive, Lazear struggled to maintain his footing — he finished the game with 65 yards on 14 carries — and Kingscott struggled to maintain a rhythm. The junior quarterback showed poise by making tough completions on strong throws over the middle, but also showed inexperience by trying to force the ball to covered receivers. While he threw for 109 yards on 10 completions, Kingscott also threw three interceptions, two of which came in Springbrook territory, while the Vikings were driving. Brantley, who played cornerback in addition to his quarterbacking duties, corralled the final interception for the Blue Devils at midfield in the fourth quarter to kick off the game-winning drive.

‘‘We came into the game knowing that we had to be hyped and ready to play on our home field,” Brantley, who passed for 120 yards but also threw three interceptions, said. ‘‘All season, everyone has looked past us, thinking that Springbrook is an easy victory. Hopefully, we opened up a couple of eyes today.”

Clearly, the Vikings’ eyes have been opened to the predicament that the loss has caused them. After their 47-7 victory over Bethesda rival B-CC last week, the Vikings looked to be peaking as the playoffs approached, and had a schedule that gave them the inside track to a postseason berth. While a fourth loss does not eliminate Whitman from the playoffs, Richard Montgomery’s 40-0 win over Walter Johnson on Friday put the Rockets well ahead of the Vikings in the 4A West Region standings. Eric Wallich, Whitman’s head coach, was visibly disappointed at the realization that his team is now on the outside looking in at the playoffs — but are not eliminated yet.

‘‘We made big mistakes and it cost us,” he said. ‘‘The kids did not play well today. They came out flat and they made a lot of mental errors. They thought they were going to come in here and just dominate and Springbrook did a good job of coming out and playing tough. Now we have to play for pride as much as anything else.”

The Blue Devils hope that the victory puts them back on the winning track for the rest of the season. Their move to the 4A North Region makes a playoff berth a long shot — Springbrook is in the same region as Sherwood (6-1) and tough Baltimore competition Perry Hall (7-0), Parkville (6-1) and Patterson (6-1) — but a win such as this, on homecoming, bodes well for the future.

‘‘It’s an attitude thing,” Wendel said. ‘‘You got to try to get the old swagger back, and this certainly helps because Whitman is a good football team. This was a big-step victory for our program.”

Notes: In addition to Brantley’s interception, Nick Oates and Darius Hill picked off passes for Springbrook ... Kingscott, Scott Colton and Max Vinograd recorded interceptions for Whitman.