Preview: Northern Highlands Highlanders vs. Ramapo Raiders
Northern Highlands and Ramapo are an even 3-3 against one another since September of 2018, but not for long. The Northern Highlands Highlanders will face off against the Ramapo Raiders at TBD on Friday. Both teams are coming into the match red-hot, with Northern Highlands sitting on five straight victories and Ramapo on ten.
With a playoff game on the line, Northern Highlands rose to the challenge on Friday. They snuck past Ridge with a 31-26 victory.
Nate Johnson was his usual excellent self, rushing for 117 yards and a touchdown on only 13 carries, while also throwing for 239 yards and two touchdowns while completing 71.4% of his passes. The team also got some help courtesy of Freddie Kanning, who picked up 90 receiving yards and two touchdowns.
Meanwhile, Ramapo put the finishing touches on their seventh blowout victory of the season on Friday. They were the clear victor by a 52-27 margin over Morris Knolls. Given Ramapo's advantage in MaxPreps' New Jersey football rankings (they are ranked tenth, while Morris Knolls is ranked 59th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.
Northern Highlands pushed their record up to 9-2 with that win, which was their eighth straight on the road dating back to last season. It's not like the team was facing easy opposition over that stretch either, as it included 8-3 Ramapo and 8-3 Ramapo (their opponents had an average overall winning percentage of 57.8% over those games). As for Ramapo, their victory bumped their record up to 10-0.
Northern Highlands and Ramapo were almost perfectly matched up in their previous meeting back in September, but Northern Highlands suffered an agonizing 34-33 defeat. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Ramapo's Landon De prima, who threw for 288 yards and four touchdowns while completing 75% of his passes. Now that Northern Highlands knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
