The Venice Indians will head out on the road to face off against the Lehigh Lightning at 7:30 p.m. on Friday. The teams are on pretty different trajectories at the moment (Venice has five straight wins, Lehigh has five straight defeats), but none of that matters once you're on the field.
Venice's upcoming contest probably won't be as stressful as their last, when they took on another nationally ranked opponent: Cocoa, who was ranked 27th at the time (Venice was ranked 19th). Venice came out on top in a nail-biter against Cocoa on Friday, sneaking past 54-51.
Dorien Irving-Jones was his usual excellent self, rushing for 226 yards and two touchdowns while picking up 7.3 yards per carry, and also picking up 36 receiving yards and a touchdown. The dominant performance gave him a new career-high in rushing yards. Another player making a difference was Jayce Nixon, who threw for 279 yards and three touchdowns.
Perhaps unsurprisingly given the score, Venice was unstoppable on the ground and finished the game with 290 rushing yards. They easily outclassed their opponents in that department as Cocoa only rushed for 138.
Meanwhile, Lehigh was beaten by North Fort Myers 41-13 two weeks ago.
Although Lehigh took the loss, they still got scores from Johnny Ash and Sean Battle.
Venice's victory was their 14th straight at home dating back to last season, which pushed their record up to 5-0. As for Lehigh, their loss dropped their record down to 0-4.
Everything came up roses for Venice against Lehigh in their previous matchup back in November of 2022, as the team secured a 39-0 win. The rematch might be a little tougher for Venice since the squad won't have the home-field advantage this time around. We'll see if the change in venue makes a difference.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
