Raiders crush Cavaliers 41-7

SANFORD — Following last Friday’s 41-7 demolishing of Southern Lee, the Richmond Senior High School Raider Football Team ride a two-game win streak ahead of Thursday’s rescheduled game against undefeated Pinecrest.

The Southern Lee Cavaliers’ only points came late in the fourth quarter, long after Richmond pulled its starters, which has the Raiders feeling encouraged heading into a game against returning Sandhills Athletic Conference champion Pinecrest.

“It’s always good to get a win in conference, especially starting off in the conference going 1-0. That was our goal. Figure out how to win this week, and get to next week next week,” Richmond coach Brad Denson said. “The guys played hard tonight, and took care of the ball for the most part. The defense is still playing lights out, and the offense, as I told them at the half, ‘If we do what we’re coached to do, then good things will happen for us.’”

During the SAC opener last Friday, the Raiders dominated Southern Lee from the first to the last whistle. Shortly after a three-and-out by the defense on the opening drive, quarterback Evan Hodges, the first of his two rushing touchdowns. Hodges also had a hot hand in the pocket, completing 5 of 8 passes for 52 yards, but fellow junior quarterback Dominic Tillman made the most of his trio of completions For 81 yards with a pair of those throws resulting in touchdown completions to receiver Keonta Davis.

“It was great coaching. Listening to Coach Denson right here telling us what we had to do. We’ll walk into next week with our head up. Have a good week of practice and just focus. All the credit to the O-line. They did their job, and what they had to do,” Tillman said.

With only 16 pass attempts all game, the majority of the Raiders’ offensive production came on the ground. Running back Chance Crowder carried the majority of the load for the Raiders while averaging 9 yards per carry for 55 yards, followed by Tillman’s 52 yards, but Hodges and running back Jordan Bostic made the most of their handful of carries with the pair each picking up a pair of TDs. Although happy with his two catches for TDs and a team-leading 83 receiving yards, Davis said the Raiders were capable of putting more points on the board.

“We executed well. The quarterbacks got us the ball. We did great with running (the ball), we (receivers) just have to block better on the outside. We blocked horrible. We could have had more touchdowns … Next week we’ll clean it up,” Davis said.

Defensively, similar to a magic trick, what happens in the background may be more interesting than the results the audience sees on stage. While the same cast of characters continued creating havoc in the back field For the Raiders, fans may not see defensive tackles executing gap assignments, taking double teams in order to make it easier for defensive ends and linebackers to knife through opponents offensive lines. One of those defensive tackles was Jayden Hamilton.

“During practice, we paid attention to their formations. We knew what they were going to run. We just made the stop. It’s nice to be on this defense. Right now, I think we have the best defense in our conference and basically the whole schedule. We’re pretty good up front and in the backfield,” Hamilton said.

With last Friday’s blowout in the books, the Raiders improve to 3-2 and head on the road Thursday to face the undefeated Pinecrest Patriots. While Richmond faced some of the toughest teams in the state during their non-conference run, Pinecrest took the opposite approach this season. Only one of their first four opponents (new Hanover (2-1) have a winning record heading into this Friday. The Raiders lost their previous two encounters with the Patriots by a narrow margin and have not won in Southern Pines since 2020.

“It’s a big game for us. It’s a rivalry game for us. That amps it up some. it’s a team that came [to Rockingham] last year and beat us. We have to go back and visit them this year at their place. It’s a tough place to play. With that, we need all of Raider Nation there,” Denson said.