The Lakewood Leopards used their bye week last week to prepare for a run at the conference championship. They are now just one win away from at least a share of it, after they took care of business on Friday night, with their 28-0 win over visiting Princeton.

The Leopards honored their seniors Friday night as well, as it was LHS’s Senior Night.

Lakewood got on the board first, when on their second drive of the night, Carsell Bennett punched in a 4 yard touchdown run to cap off a 42 yard scoring drive. The Leopards held a 7-0 lead after the opening frame.

In the second quarter, the Leopards were able to build their lead to 21-0, after a touchdown at the 11:53 an 4:15 marks of the frame. The first score was Bennett’s second touchdown run of the night, this time, also from four yards out. William Moore scored Lakewood’s final touchdown of the half to give them the comfortable three-score lead entering the halftime locker-room.

In the second half, Lakewood would add one more score when DJ Eason scored on a short run near the end of the third. This gave the Leopards the 28-0 final margin of victory.

Lakewood was led offensively by Carsell Bennett, who had 89 yards on 17 carries. William Moore added 6 carries for 29 yards.

Zach Tanner had 4 completions in 6 attempts with a total of 57 yards passing on the night. Nyquan Murphy led the receiving totals for Lakewood, as he racked up 24 yards.

Defensively, Tristen Holmes had a fumble recovery and 12 tackles in a stellar performance for the Leopards. James Sinclair added 9 tackles, and Jirah Cooper and Chris Torres each had 7 tackles. Cooper added a fumble recovery to his line, and Mailk Rogers had a sack and a fumble recovery.

Lakewood’s head coach James Lewis admitted that they didn’t do anything extraordinary on Friday, but that his team did what they had to do to get the job done.

“We are pleased to get the win. We were not all that fired up tonight, but we had a workman’s attitude, and went out there and were able to earn the win,” he said. “We have an opportunity to put a trophy in the trophy case next week if we beat Hobbton, so that’s the task we have our eyes on it. We’ll have to be ready to play.”

Lakewood travels to Hobbton next week (Friday) for the regular season finale at 7 p.m. A win will secure them at least a share of the Carolina 1A Conference Championship.

By Adam Capps

[email protected]