Paramus Catholic is 2-7 against DePaul Catholic since October of 2014 but they'll have a chance to close the gap a little bit on Friday. The Paramus Catholic Paladins will look to defend their home field against the DePaul Catholic Spartans at 6:30 p.m.
Paramus Catholic is coming in fresh off a high-stakes matchup with another one of New Jersey's top teams: St. Joseph Regional, who was ranked fifth in their home state at the time (Paramus Catholic was ranked 12th). Paramus Catholic came up short against St. Joseph Regional on Saturday, falling 44-19. The loss was the Paladins' first of the season.
Meanwhile, DePaul Catholic put another one in the bag on Friday to keep their perfect season alive. They blew past Seton Hall Prep 34-14. DePaul Catholic's victory was all the more impressive since the Pirates were averaging only 16.25 points allowed on the season.
Nolan James continued his habit of posting crazy stat lines, rushing for 242 yards and a touchdown while picking up 11.5 yards per carry. The dominant performance gave him a new career-high in rushing yards. The team also got some help courtesy of De'Zie Jones, who picked up 165 receiving yards and three touchdowns.
Perhaps unsurprisingly given the score, DePaul Catholic was unstoppable on the ground and finished the game with 271 rushing yards. That strong performance was nothing new for the team: they've now rushed for at least 196 rushing yards in four consecutive matches.
DePaul Catholic wouldn't let Seton Hall Prep keep a hold of the ball as they managed to force two fumbles. DePaul Catholic can thank Logan Nagle and Yasire Howell for forcing both of them.
Having lost for the first time this season, Paramus Catholic fell to 2-1. As for DePaul Catholic, their win was their fifth straight at home dating back to last season, which pushed their record up to 4-0.
Paramus Catholic ended up a good deal behind DePaul Catholic when the teams last played back in September of 2023, losing 28-12. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of James, who rushed for 228 yards and three touchdowns while picking up 8.8 yards per carry, and also caught a touchdown. Now that Paramus Catholic knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
