Everybody Chasing Top Ranked Westside As AAAA Football Play-offs Begin

By Billy G. Baker

Publisher



Moncks Corner—In AAAA of the SCHSL, the Westside (9-0) Rams finished the regular season undefeated and they are favored to defend the state title they won a year ago with a fourth quarter rally to defeat South Florence.

The AAAA state title game will be played at South Carolina State University on Friday December, 13 at 7:30 p.m.

While Westside has the horses to pull another state championship wagon in a future victory parade, “we” can’t rule out Daniel, as the spoiler if the two teams keep winning in the play-offs, when could meet at Westside on December, 6 for the upper state AAAA championship.

After going a combined 8-14 in his first two seasons at Daniel back in 2016 and 2017, head Daniel coach Jeff Fruster, has said he was thankful that he was not fired at the time. What a great decision school officials made to retain him.

Since 2018, under Coach Fruster, Daniel has a collective record of 82-5, including three state titles as they prepare to play host Dreher High this week in the first round of the AAAA play-offs.

Daniel’s only loss was to AAAAA member JL Mann (28-23) early in the season. To date Daniel is 9-1 and they have defeated teams 496-153 at the end of the regular season.

Daniel won the Region 2-AAAA  title with a 6-0 record after beating Seneca 42-21 in the regular-season finale last week.   

Daniel was trailing 14-7 late in the first half before coming up with a pair of long touchdown passes in the final minute to take a 21-14 lead to the locker room. That started a run of 35 straight points.

Quarterback Grayson Clary had a monster game, completing 19 of 27 passes for 374 yards and five touchdowns. Trey Wimbley had a big night, catching four passes for 157 yards and three touchdowns. Jason Bish had seven catches for 147 yards and the other two touchdown receptions.

Clary’s performance put an exclamation point on what was a tremendous regular season for him. Heading into the Seneca contest, the sophomore had completed 120- of-162 passes for 1,847 yards and 26 touchdowns. That means he has 31 touchdown passes on the season when you add in his performance against the Bobcats.

Bish had 29 catches for 481 yards and six scores while Wimbley had 21 receptions for 405 yards and five scores. Quint Cumbie had 30 catches for 354 yards and five scores, and Elijah Lipsey had 23 catches for 438 yards and six touchdowns.

Clary had also rushed for 240 yards and five touchdowns. Tremaine Davis Jr. was the leading rusher with 332 yards and five scores on 29 carries.

The Daniel defense is led by senior linebacker Spencer Conn and junior defensive end Dexter Johnson. Conn has a team high 78 tackles to go with nine tackles for loss. Johnson has a team 14 ½ TFLs among his 57 stops.

Johnson is also the sack leader with 6 ½. Junior Bryson Freeman has 4 ½. Davis and Christian Chancellor Jr. led in interceptions with two apiece. They had both returned an interception for a touchdown as had Conn.

When the Lions can’t get the ball in the end zone, they have pretty good opportunity to get some points. Placekicker Bruce Brown, a North-South pick,  was 9- of -11 on field goal attempts with a long of 48 yards. He’s also made 48- of 49- PAT’s. extra points.

Westside will host Lakewood this week in the first round of the play-offs.

Woods, a South Carolina football commitment, was also chosen for the Shrine Bowl. After 8 games of the season Woods had completed 107-0f-164 passes for 2,045 yards and 24 TD’s.

His top WR targets are fellow Shrine Bowl member Chamarryus Bomar who had 777 receiving yards on 77 catches and 11 TD’s after 8 games. The leading rusher for the Rams is senior Sharode Richardson with 650 net yards on 80 carries and 9 TD’s after 8 games.

On defense the rams are very stout. They are led by junior MLB Jaxx Wilson (55 tackles) and senior OLB Jameson Wilson (50 tackles), Soph LB Malachi Peterson has also contributed (42 tackles, 1 TFL). MLB Jaydon Hall (5-10, 190) has 44 tackles and the sack leader is junior DT Kwon Simpkins with four. 

A favorite to win the lower state AAAA is ball control Hartsville (8-1-1) who is ranked third in the current HSSR AAAA ranking. The Red Foxes have out-scored teams 453-181 this season and they have a quality win over Dillon on their resume this season.

Hartsville has pounded out 2,628 rushing yards on 348 carries. Their top three running backs are Hakeen Watters (119-1,053-17 TD’s) along with Kylif Miller (102-696). Dual threat QB EJ Smith has completed 66-0f-123 passes for 1,302 yards and as a rusher he has gained 535 yards on 78 carries and 9 TD’s.

(Please see feature story on Hartsville on page 55 of this issue)

South Pointe is also loaded with a lot of talent and they have state championship tradition on their resume as well.