FORT PIERCE – This one was easy.
Last night (Oct. 18) at Lawnwood Stadium, the eighth-ranked Cardinal Newman Crusaders wasted little time in dispatching the Fort Pierce Central Cobras in their 40-14 road win.
The Crusaders (6-2) maximized their entire defensive unit in the first quarter as they forced two turnovers on downs by the Cobras (3-5).
The first Crusaders score came at the 6:27 mark, when freshman quarterback Davi Belford (three touchdown passes, no interceptions) found sophomore running back for a short touchdown pass to give their team a 6-0 lead.
The next touchdown occurred for Cardinal Newman with 15 seconds left in the first quarter, when Mizell ran it in for a 1-yard score.
An extra point by kicker Andrew MacMillian extended the road team’s lead to 13-0.
As we went to the second frame, it was mostly a defensive effort by both teams. But Cardinal Newman running back Henry Bennett was able to break through, as he muscled through the Fort Pierce Central line en route to a short touchdown run, which extended his team’s lead to 19-0 with less than four minutes left in the first half.
The 19-0 score held into halftime and almost half of the third quarter, when Fort Pierce Central was doing its best to stay in the game.
The sequence of last night’s game happened in just two play.
It started with a short punt from Fort Pierce Central, which gave Cardinal Newman the ball at the home team’s 26-yard line at the 7:11 mark.
And then in just one play, Belfort threw a laser directly to junior athlete Chris Presto, whose 26-yard touchdown catch with 7:05 left in the third ended any holes of a Fort Pierce Central comeback.
“He trusted me to get into the end zone,” Presto said of Belfort. “That’s what he did.”
Belfort’s two-point conversion pass to senior Domenico Fusca provided extra insurance for Cardinal Newman, which extended the lead even further to 27-0.
At the 4:42 mark, Belfort got his third touchdown pass of the game, this time to senior athlete Ja’Kavian Williams. Another extra point by MacMillian made it 34-0 in favor of Cardinal Newman.
And for the rest of the game, Cardinal Newman eased off the pedal as it was outscored by a margin of 14-6 by Fort Pierce Central. This game decision at the end honestly looked quite good from a sportsmanship standpoint.
“I thought we had a great performance offensively,” Belfort said. “I was happy with the way we played. Me, Chris, and Tovani met up on Saturday. We watched film of Clewiston. We watched film of the team we just played. We saw what we needed to execute on…The line held up well. They’re the reasons why we made the touchdowns. If not for them, we can’t do anything on offense.”
Cardinal Newman head coach Jack Daniels spoke on his team’s win over Fort Pierce Central.
“We just got it rolling,” Daniels said. “It was our night.”
NOTE: The next and final two regular season games for Cardinal Newman are at home in Week 9 against Melbourne Central Catholic (1-5) on Friday, Oct. 22 and against Gulliver Prep (Miami) (5-1) in Week 10 on Friday, Oct. 29. Both games are set for a 7 p.m. kickoff.
PHOTO CREDITS: Shane Robinson
