The Tampa Catholic Crusaders will head out on the road to face off against the Robinson Knights at 7:30 p.m. on Friday. Tampa Catholic has been dominant on offense recently, as they've racked up an incredible 163 points over their last four games.
Tampa Catholic pushed their score all the way to 35 on Friday, but even that wasn't enough to win. They took a serious blow against Jesuit, falling 66-35. While losing is never fun, Tampa Catholic can't take it too hard given the team's big disadvantage in MaxPreps' Florida football rankings (they are ranked 186th, while Jesuit is ranked 34th).
The losing side was boosted by Trey Hedden, who threw for 247 yards and three touchdowns while picking up 10.7 yards per attempt, and also punched in two rushing scores. Hedden has been hot recently, having posted three or more passing touchdowns the last three times he's played. The team also got some help courtesy of Tj Moore, who picked up 130 receiving yards and a touchdown.
Meanwhile, Robinson came tearing into Friday's matchup with six straight wins (a stretch where they outscored their opponents by an average of 32.2 points) and they left with even more momentum. They came out on top against Braden River by a score of 27-20.
ERIC ARCHIELD JR. was his usual excellent self, throwing for 294 yards and a touchdown while completing 74.2% of his passes, and also punching in a touchdown on the ground. Jaylen Holman also deserves a shout-out for his two touchdowns.
Tampa Catholic's defeat was their fourth straight on the road, which bumped their record down to 4-5. Admittedly, the team was facing some tough opposition over that stretch, including 8-2 Fort Myers and 8-2 Robinson (their opponents had an average overall winning percentage of 80% over those games). As for Robinson, their win bumped their record up to 8-2.
Tampa Catholic and Robinson were almost perfectly matched up in their previous matchup back in September, but Tampa Catholic suffered an agonizing 25-24 loss. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Robinson's ARCHIELD JR., who threw for 208 yards and two touchdowns, and also punched in a touchdown on the ground. Now that Tampa Catholic knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? There's only one way to find out.
