Florida high school football thriller: Norland nips Booker T. Washington
MIAMI GARDENS, FLORIDA - Championship-caliber teams find ways to win even when they’re not at their best.
Miami Norland demonstrated that on Thursday night in a thrilling, 20-19, comeback victory over Booker T. Washington at Nathaniel Traz Powell Stadium.
The Vikings (6-0) dealt with adversity all night, trailing 12-7 at halftime and 19-7 entering the fourth quarter.
Behind junior quarterback Ennio Yapoor, who threw for a touchdown and ran for another in the fourth quarter, the Vikings rallied in the final minutes to remain unbeaten and set up a Class 2M-District 13 showdown next Friday night against four-time defending state champion, Miami Central.
Ennio Yapoor threw a fourth quarter TD pass and rushed for the decisive TD to rally Miami Norland to a 20-19 win over Booker T. Washington.
Photo by Joe Frisaro
“We didn’t play our A-Game, and we still got the win,” Norland coach Daryle Heidelburg said. “I think that’s the best type of win that you can ask for, because there was so much adversity we had to go through.”
For Booker T. Washington (3-2), it was a disappointing loss because the Tornadoes seemingly had the game in hand. But in the fourth quarter, quarterback Claudell Sherman, who was elusive running and accurate passing, went down with an injury.
BTW’s offense wasn’t able to manage much after Sherman left the game.
For Norland, completing the late rally is a big confidence boost heading into the showdown with Central.
“This shows that we can fight adversity,” Yapoor said. “It shows we can get the running game going. We should never count ourselves out, and people shouldn’t count us out.”
Norland now can look ahead to Miami Central: Let the hype begin.
The Vikings had to take care of business against a formidable BTW squad, and they did just that.
Next up is national power, Miami Central (2-2).
“This was another obstacle that we had to face, to not look ahead,” Heidelburg said. “We understand that Central is the King of the Hill right now. They are the standard. Like I tell my team all the time, we want to overtake their territory. Everybody knows if you’re going to overtake somebody’s territory, you’ve got to go kill the king. They are the king. That’s going to be our mindset. This game, hopefully it’s going to elevate us for next week.”
Booker T. Washington controls the first three quarters
Entering the fourth quarter, it looked like Booker T. Washington was primed to pull off the mild upset.
Addition for the Tornadoes, everything was pointing to them building momentum. After all, they entered Thursday having recorded back-to-back shutouts of LaSalle and Miami Jackson. In those games, BTW outscored its opponents, 79-0.
Early on, Booker T. was in control. In the first quarter, Sherman tossed an 8-yard TD pass to Anton Smith. The extra point, however, was no good, which ended up hurting them all night.
The Tornadoes had a huge play before halftime when Ben Hanks Jr. had a 57-yard interception return for a touchdown with just 19.5 seconds left in the second quarter. But the 2-point conversion try was no good.
Disaster struck Booker T. on the ensuing kickoff as Ivory Aikens of Norland had an 89-yard return for a touchdown with just 5.5 seconds remaining in the first half.
“My teammates blocked for me, and I’m thankful for that,” Aikens said. “This win puts us in great position to show everybody that we’re great.”
In the third quarter, Sherman scampered 22 yards for a touchdown that gave Booker T. a 19-7 lead going into the last quarter.
After that, momentum swung in Norland’s favor and BTW was unable to pad its lead.
Norland makes key plays down the stretch
Momentum swung in the Vikings’ favor after Booker T. wasted an excellent scoring opportunity that could have iced the game late in the third quarter.
Sherman raced 67 yards to the Vikings’ 5, setting up first-and-goal. But a key penalty by the Tornadoes backed them up, and they were stopped on fourth down.
Yapoor took over, and engineered a scoring drive, tossing a 26-yard TD pass to Joaquin Reid, making it 19-14 with 8:55 left.
In the closing minutes, Isaiah Scott made a terrific diving catch on a 26-yard pass play, setting up first-and-goal. Yapoor scored the game-winning touchdown on an 8-yard run with 3:30 remaining.
Scott came up big again with 1:57 remaining, intercepting a Booker T. pass at the Vikings’ 16-yard-line.
“This was a team effort,” Yapoor said. “We had to all come together as a team. When the offense wasn’t showing up, the special teams came in and made up for our offense. Our defense kept getting us stops. We slowly got back into that game, and we got ourselves a tough win.”
-- Joe Frisaro | jfrisaro@gmail.com | @sblivefl
