Defense leaves on high note as Allen’s strip sack ends St. Andrews spring football game

LAURINBURG — Team Blue had trailed much of the afternoon. While big plays and sacks were being made, Team White, which was the offense, seemed too overpowering.

The dominant win they earned last year in the inaugural St. Andrews spring football game looked one and done.

Then, Corneilus Allen changed all of that.

On the final series of the afternoon, Allen strip-sacked quarterback Blaydon Blake, and Tyrell Counts made the fumble recovery, giving Team Blue, which represented the defense, a 26-24 come-from-behind win over Team White Saturday at Knights Field.

“I seen him in shotgun, and I was just like, we need some pressure on the quarterback ‘cause he’s just been throwing it,” Allen said. “So, I was just like, coach told me to blitz, and I was supposed to blitz through B-gap, but it was clogged up. So, I just blitzed right through A-gap, and I made the sack.”

“I think it’s wonderful when you see your defense able to understand the importance of big plays,” St. Andrews coach Bob Curtin said. “You don’t always aim for big plays. You aim for being extremely disciplined in the right place at the right time. And if you do those things, big plays happen. And Corn Allen, we’ll check it on film, but from all intensive purposes, he did everything he was supposed to; he did it the right way, incredibly disciplined. And then the big play happens. And that’s what we’re going to look forward to seeing a whole lot of next season, I hope.”

Allen, a freshman linebacker, was taking the field for live action as a college player for the first time. Allen was with the program last season but didn’t get to play.

“It was just a good opportunity because I couldn’t even play last year,” Allen said. “So, it was a good opportunity for me to play. But I haven’t played in a whole year. We just went out there and had fun, played with our brothers that we’ve been going against the past two weeks.”

Allen’s sack and Counts’ fumble recovery were each worth two points — part of the scoring system used for the game; other defensive point counts included three for an interception, three for a three-and-out, two for a sack and two for a turnover on downs. Offensively, a touchdown was worth six points, a play over 20 yards was worth two and a play over 50 yards was worth three.

In total, Team White had 12 points from two touchdowns, six points from three plays of over 20 yards and six points from two plays over 50 yards; Team Blue had 12 points from six forced turnovers on downs, six points from three sacks, six points from two three-and-out stops and two points from the game-winning fumble recovery.

”I’m very pleased,” Curtin said. “I feel incredibly confident that we made great strides this spring. These 60 guys that were out here, 60 eligible, I call them warriors, they gave it their all. These are the guys that are getting themselves academically right, if they’re not, which they are. They’re going to class. They’re going weight training. And so, this is a really good foundation. And then, looking forward, when we bring the new group of recruits in, they have a good core group of individuals who really want to be a St. Andrews Knight football player. And they want to do it the right way within the right culture.”

Each quarter had a 20-minute running clock, and Team White ran three drives in the first and third and one in the second and fourth, with a goalline series in the second. The length of each possession for Team White started at either its own 20-, 35- or 45-yard line.

Starting for Team White at quarterback was Dylan O’Banks. His performance was cut short, though, because of a shoulder injury. Blake operated as the signal caller in his place, throwing touchdown passes of seven and 30 yards — the only two of the day.

“Dylan came in and moved the troops really well up and down the field,” Curtin said. “Defense made some good plays, of course. We saw a lot of positive things within our new offense out of Dylan. He’s fine, just bumped up a little bit; fell on that shoulder. And this is a spring game. And so, we put Blaydon in there, and he did great. We redshirted Blaydon last year. And so, this year, he got an opportunity to go live. And it’s stressful the first couple of times. The speed of the game is a little bit different than in high school. I thought he handled it really well.”

Blake’s first score was in the second quarter to Cadyn Graves — a former Scotland High wide receiver who transferred in from NCAA Division II The University of North Carolina at Pembroke; the second came in the fourth on a fake-option pass to Anthony Robinson.

The pass to Robinson broke up an 18-18 tie that opened the period; Team White led 7-4 at the end of the first and 13-9 at halftime.

With a close score on the board in a spring game, it’s usually an indicator of a balanced offense and defense — something Curtin believes is the result of more work put in during the offseason.

“This program grows a little bit every year,” Curtin said. “We get a little bit better every year, and sometimes it doesn’t show because we make some hard decisions to ensure that growth occurs. So last year was the first legitimate spring-ball game we’ve ever had. This year we added a Division II controlled spring game with Shaw University. That really motivated people. But you can only do that when you have enough eligible personnel to do it, both physically, academically, mentally, psychologically. So when you take our great 15 days of practice, the energy level and the excitement from these 60 warriors, they understand, hey, we’re different.”

St. Andrews’ 2024 football schedule is still in the works but is set to be released soon.