Notre Dame hosts E.D. White in Select playoffs

CROWLEY – The playoffs move into week two with Notre Dame preparing for what they basically were wishing for. The Pios earned a first round bye with the #4 seed in the 12 team Division 3 bracket and will get a change of scenery when E.D. White visits Gardiner Stadium Friday night.
“I kind of like having the opportunity to play teams that are not as familiar with us,” noted Pios head coach Lewis Cook. “We have a wrinkle here and there that we put in according to our opponent, but we’ve basically done the same things for a long time. When we see the same teams every year, they get to know us and it gets easier for them to prepare for us.”
Notre Dame doesn’t get to the see the Cardinals very much. In fact, all five meetings between the schools have come in the playoffs with Notre Dame holding a 4-1 advantage. The teams last hooked up in the 2001 post season when the Pios took a 31-7 quarterfinal win on the road in Thibodeaux.
“I remember that game being kind of similar to what we see this year in that they like to run the ball and had a big, burly fullback like they have this year,” added Cook. “They played a coverage back then that we thought we could go deep on and worked a play with our runningback out of the backfield and scored on it. They don’t necessarily play that same coverage, but they are similar looking in some ways with big guys up front and we will have some things we feel we can take advantage of on our end in a similar way.”
The fifth seeded Cardinals are coming off a 31-6 opening round win over Loyola Prep of Shreveport. In that game, E.D. White rushed for 262 yards and gained 349 total yafds while holding the Flyers to 176 yards.
“They won’t change from what they do,” continued Cook. “They will try to run on us and our strength has been our defensive front, so hopefully we can keep them from big plays like they had last week. They hurt Loyola with field position on their special teams and with big plays. They want to get the ball into the hand of their running back, Jeremy Rounds, and if he comes out of there he can go for long ways. We have to make them drive the ball and not give them big pieces of yardage.”
In last week’s game, Loyola drove 65 yards in 15 plays with the opening kickoff for a 6-0 lead but had little success after that as E.D. White ran off 31 unanswered points in the win. Runningback Rounds rushed for 99 yards and had 87 receiving yards to lead the Cardinals.
Quarterback Ben Sposito got the scoring started with a 27 yard TD run and then Rounds took a screen pass from Sposito up the sideline for 64 yards to set up the second score. Fullback Darius Charles powered in from two yards and kicker Winston Jones booted a 39 yard field goal for a 17-6 halftime lead.
The Cardinals got a 19 yard third quarter scoring run from Nik Shanklin, who gained 42 yards on seven carries. Rounds capped the scoring with a 70 yard fourth quarter TD run.
“We’ll see how much they look at the films and get an idea of what we do,” summed up Cook. “They’ll come here not familiar with the intensity or speed our guys play with. They won’t know how our guys prepare each week for an opponent in trying not to leave any stones unturned. We think that is an advantage for us this week and every week.”
SCOUTING REPORT
E.D. White finished the 2013 regular season at 5-5, was third in District 9-3A and dropped a first round playoff game to Parkview, 14-0. In his first season as head coach, Chris Bergeron has the Cardinals headed back in the right direction.
This season got off to a good start with a 21-17 win over rival Vandebilt Catholic and a 20-14 win over St. James. The only common opponent with Notre Dame was Catholic, New Iberia, who handed E.D. White its first loss of the season, 48-14, in week four.
After a loss the next week to 5A Shaw, the Cardinals won district games over Donaldsonville, 25-24, and Franklin 46-6. Patterson prevailed in a showdown for the league lead, 42-14, but E.D. White rebounded to finish the season with wins over Assumption (32-12) and Berwick (50-14) to take the runner up spot in district.
Switching to a pro style offense with only one returning starter up front hasn’t lessened the effect of the ground game which formerly operated from the flex bone. The Cardinals entered the playoffs with momentum after rushing for 377 yards against Berwick, bringing their regular season rushing total to 2,262 yards and 32 touchdowns. Junior running back Jeremy Rounds led the ground attack with 94 yards and a score against Berwick.
Three other backs got into the end zone with Kairon Brooks scoring on TD runs of 13 and 44 yards, Nik Shanklin running one in from 19 yards and senior Darius Charles adding a 20 yard TD. Charles led the Cardinals last season with 787 yards and 12 TDs.
Quarterback Ben Sposito threw for 125 yards against Berwick and ran for 63 yards with touchdown runs of 29 and 4 yards. The Cardinal defense held Berwick to just 159 total yards.
E.D. White calls its defense a 4-2-5 alignment which means they will move around in multiple sets. Senior William Eichler leads the defense line and senior Frank Robichaux is a returning starter at linebacker. Defensive backs Thomas Legendre and Marcus Kliebert return as starters in the secondary.
EXTRA POINTS
Remember all the preseason concerns about the loss of four starters on the offensive line. The maturing process seems to have gone quite well. The Pios have rushed for 2,559 yards and scored 36 touchdowns.
Senior Damon Comeaux stepped into the lead role when Lance Bertrand missed three games due to an injury. Comeaux has run for 782 yards and 12 scores, averaging over eight yards a carry. Bertrand gained 540 yards in seven games, averaging over six yards a carry and scoring 7 TDs. For the season, Comeaux averages 78 yards a game and Bertrand 77 a game. With both healthy heading into the post season, the ground game benefits from a fresh, explosive back in the game at all times.
GAME BALL AWARDS
The Pios had the week off and so did our pregame, so let’s catch up with recognition from the week ten win over Kaplan!
Big Play of the Game – Boedy Borill 23 yard TD catch from Brad Stoma – Less than a minute after taking a 7-0 lead, the Pios defense forced and recovered a fumble at the Kaplan 23 yard line. On the first play, Stoma arched a rainbow toward Borill streaking behind defenders at the left goal line pylon. The junior receiver stretched out for a diving catch to make it 14-0.
Brad Stoma – Completed 8 of 12 passes for 94 yards and three touchdowns and rushed for 63 yards and a score in his final regular season home game as a three year starter at quarterback.
Logan LaGrange – 8 tackles including 2 sacks and a stop for a loss and forced a fumble.
Conner Kirsch – 6 tackles with 3 sacks and 3 tackles for a loss plus a fumble recovery.
Pios offensive line and tight ends – shredded Kaplan defense for 267 rushing yards by Pios ball carriers.