Tuesday Football Roundup: Saint Stephen's Brewer rushes for 4 TDs; Sarasota Christian collects win

TUESDAY

Saint Stephen's 28, Cambridge Christian 10

BRADENTON ― Tuesday night, Cam Brewer completed a personal game of Crazy Eights.

The Saint Stephen’s running back rushed for four touchdowns, giving him eight in the last two games, as the host Falcons improved to 2-4 on the season with a 28-10 victory over winless Cambridge Christian in a game played at Falcon Field.

Brewer’s scoring runs covered 37, 43, 60, and 48 yards. The senior, who missed four games with a concussion, tallied four TDs in Saint Stephen’s 43-0 win on Oct. 4 over Jordan Christian Prep. His 37-yard scoring scamper early in the second quarter on Tuesday night gave the Falcons a 7-0 lead with the Gavin Winterhalter PAT.

With 5:25 left before halftime, Brewer ripped off a 43-yard TD run, outrunning the Lancer defense to the end zone to make it 14-0 with the Winterhalter conversion. Cambridge cut that lead in half with two minutes remaining on a TD pass from quarterback Cannon Farragut.

You voted: See the Sarasota, Manatee midseason high school football offensive and defensive MVPs

But getting the ball back one more time before halftime, the Falcons promptly gave it to Brewer, whose 60-yard scoring gallop on first-and-10 upped the Falcon margin to 21-7. But his most impressive TD of the four came on Saint Stephen’s opening possession of the fourth quarter.

Taking the handoff from quarterback Harry Jones on third-and-2 from the Lancer 48, Brewer appeared to be stopped short of the first down. But keeping his legs moving, Brewer broke free from a couple of Cambridge defenders, then shook off every other tackle attempt on a 48-yard scoring run. He finished the night with 228 yards rushing. Besides the touchdown pass from Farragut, the Lancers got a 39-yard field goal from Gaston Gramatica, the son of former Tampa Bay Buccaneers kicker Martin Gramatica. In the first quarter, Cambridge had Gramatica attempt a 64-yard field goal, but his kick fell about 10 yards short of the uprights.

Saint Stephen’s takeaways

1. When RB Cam Brewer suffered a concussion in the Falcons’ 62-14 week 2 loss to Master’s Academy, the worst concussion head coach Chris Valcarcel had ever seen, it was thought Brewer would be lost for the season. But returning to the Falcon lineup for the team’s Oct. 4 game against Jordan Christian Prep, Brewer has been a “hungry” runner, according to Valcarcel. “It’s his senior year,” Valcarcel said. “He dug deep. He cares a lot for these guys and this team. He’s been running with a cause.” Two games with eight rushing TDs and more than 400 yards would seem to confirm that. It also helped that Valcarcel juggled his offensive line. “All we had to do was just switch a couple of guys around,” Brewer said. “Get a couple of guys in, and get a couple of guys out. It’s been phenomenal.”

2. It was a night for Cam Brewer , which means it wasn’t a night for QB Harry Jones. The 6-foot-6 Canadian import lost more yards on Lancer sacks and negative plays than he gained on completed passes. But Valcarcel said the junior has come a long way. “He is leaps and bounds better than he was at the beginning of the season,” Valcarcel said. “He’s not running for his life, scared. He’s working with (former head coach) Tod Creneti on his mechanics and will work with him in the offseason. He’s doing a really good job of managing the offense.”

3. In addition to holding primary Cambridge Christian RB Nathaniel Lusk to fewer than 40 yards rushing, the Falcons intercepted Lancer QB Cannon Farragut three times, one each by FS Jackson Riffe, freshman DB Gavin Lyssy, and MLB Ryan Jensen. While the victory was important, Valcarcel said the Oct. 4 43-0 win over Jordan Christian Prep was absolutely necessary for the 0-4 Falcons. “I told the guys last week that it was a turning point in the season,” he said. “It needed to be. This is the game we have to come out. This is the point of the season when we either continue to lose, or we figure out how to win. My message to the guys before this game was, ‘Now we have to prove that it wasn’t a fluke last week.’ And I feel like they really wrapped their heads around it. It’s easy to be complacent with losing. A frame of mind. And these guys have really stayed positive through some battles and really worked forward together as a team.”

- Doug Fernandes

Hurricane Milton: Sarasota, Manatee high schools adjusting after storm, FHSAA football season extension

Sarasota Christian 37, Keswick Christian 28

SARASOTA ― After a wild, back-and-forth first half, Sarasota Christian held Keswick Christian scoreless in the second half for a 37-28 victory in Tuesday night football action.

Keswick had taken a 28-21 lead on an 8-yard touchdown catch by Grant Cook with 39 seconds to go in the first half, then came out determined to run the ball in the third quarter. The Crusaders took the second-half kickoff and ate up more than eight minutes on a drive that ultimately stalled at the Blazers 30-yard line.

Sarasota Christian took over and quarterback Ben Milliken completed five consecutive passes to take the Blazers into the red zone. On fourth-and-6 from the 16-yard line, Milliken found Justin Brock for a touchdown, then completed a two-point conversion pass to Travis Miller for a 29-28 lead on the second play of the fourth quarter.

The Crusaders got the ball and moved into Sarasota Christian territory before Frank Martinez fumbled and Alex Dominguez recovered for the Blazers. Aided by two Keswick penalties, the Blazers moved to the 4-yard line where Brock took a direct snap and swept around the right side for a score. Milliken then completed another two-point conversion pass to Colton Loftus to give the Blazers a 37-28 lead with 4:09 remaining in the game.

A last-ditch Crusader drive was foiled by a 13-yard sack on quarterback Landon Pauley-Sherman by Randall Collins, clinching the win for the Blazers.

"I was very, very pleased with some key defensive plays," Sarasota Christian coach Jacob Spenn said. "On offense, we got back to finding some holes in the zones and doing what we do and protected a lot better in the second half, so that was huge."

The game started like it would be easy for the Blazers as Brock returned the opening kickoff to the Keswick 26-yard line and Elijah George ran it in from there on the first play from scrimmage. The Crusaders answered with a 2-yard Pauley-Sherman TD run, then the Blazers bounced back with a 50-yard TD pass from Milliken to Collins following a fumble recovery by Noah Spenn.

After Keswick scored two consecutive times to take a 21-14 lead, Milliken completed a short pass to Loftus over the middle, who broke a tackle and outraced the defender to the goal line to tie the game at 21-21.

Sarasota Christian Takeaways

1. Spenn credited some halftime adjustments for the turnaround in the second half. "We thought in the first half that we did not get the ball in the middle of the field so we made a concerted effort," Spenn said. "They were kind of in this umbrella coverage and it gave us some fits. This was probably the best-coached team we've played all year. I think fatigue was a factor as well."

2. After completing just 6 of 14 passes in the first half, Milliken was 9 for 11 in the second half. "I just think we settled down a little bit," Milliken said. "Early on, I felt like they knew us well. They watched a lot of film and gameplanned well. I felt like we settled in in the second half and we really hit on what was working. I just think overall we just played better than we did. We had a rocky start." Milliken wound up completing 15 of 25 for 228 yards.

For the Crusaders, Pauley-Sherman finished 9 for 19 for 170 yards. Cook caught 5 passes for 149 yards.

3. The Blazers improved to 5-3 with the victory while Keswick Christian fell to 6-2. "They were ranked ahead of us in the Sunshine State conference, so this will move us up a little bit," Spenn said. "We're a first-year program. We've insured at least a .500 regular season. Our three losses were all great football games. We were in all of them so I'm excited."

― Bruce Robins

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Tuesday Football Roundup: Saint Stephen's Brewer rushes for 4 TDs; Sarasota Christian collects win