By JASON O. BOYD

Washington Daily News

YEATESVILLE – It was certainly not the outcome Northside’s football team anticipated. That wasn’t the case for Gates County.

Northside saw its season come to an end in the second round of the Class 1-A state playoffs, falling to the Barons 28-13 on a very frigid Friday night at Bing Mitchell Stadium. Gates County used a strong ground game to get an early advantage and then used its defense to frustrate the Panthers’ ground game and put them in must-have situations on third and fourth downs.

The Panthers were the No. 5 seed and saw their season end at 8-4. Gates County, the No. 12 seed, improved to 8-4 and will head to Pender County, the No. 4 seed, this Friday (Nov. 29). Pender ended Rosewood’s season on Friday, 56-28.

“I hate it for these seniors,” Northside coach Keith Boyd said. “They’ve given a lot to the program, and I’m proud of this team. At the beginning of the year, if you’d have told me we were going to be where we are, I might would have questioned it a little bit. These guys have overachieved by far and I’m so proud of them.”

Gates County held off Washington County in the first round of the state playoffs, 30-22, last Friday. Meanwhile, Northside got a first-round bye from winless East Columbus.

Despite the time off, Northside looked good at times but just couldn’t keep up with the Barons’ attack. Gates County took control in the second quarter after a back-and-forth opening period that saw long touchdown runs by each team and a stellar defensive stop by the Panthers.

Gates’ Deandry Smith hit a hole on the left side and took off for a 50-yard touchdown to give the Barons a 6-0 lead with 10:01 left in the opening quarter. Northside’s Zanek McCloud answered on the next series when he rambled 55 yards for a touchdown to tie the game at 6-all with 9:55 left in the first stanza.

Northside stopped the Barons on a long drive by stuffing Smith at the Panthers 1 yardine on fourth down on Gates’ next offensive series. Despite a horse collar penalty against the Barons on a Sincere Columbus run, Northside was later forced to punt out of its own end zone.

The Barons took the lead for good with Smith’s second touchdown, an 8-yard scamper to the left corner, with 11:12 left in the first half. Gates recovered a fumble on Northside’s next offensive series and scored eight plays later on Smith’s third touchdown, a 1-yard run.

The Barons had a 22-6 lead, but Northside still had life after McCloud’s second big touchdown run, which covered 50 yards on a reverse. Blake Wainwright’s kick made it 22-13 at the half.

“Well, I mean, we played a really competitive schedule all season long,” Gates head coach Matt Biggy said. “And our offensive line came out and they played really well up front. Running backs ran the ball hard and protected the ball. The quarterback made great reads, got the ball where it needed to be and the backs were able to do the rest.”

The Panthers’ struggles continued, especially on offense, in the third quarter. Meanwhile, the Barons continued to pound the ball with the mix of Smith, quarterback Chris Lee and Deshaun Parker, who had a 1-yard scoring run with 7:01 left in the third to extend the lead to 28-13.

“A lot of that was on the offensive line,” Biggy said. “No one’s seen the adjustment, recognizing it. The backs recognizing it and then getting the right reads and getting to the gap where they needed to be.

“They’ve played a lot of football at this point. So they’ve seen a lot and I think they did a good job executing,” Biggy added.

Northside had 179 yards rushing but only 37 from the trio of quarterback Chase Hewitt and running backs Max Vansant and Sincere Columbus, who was held to 25 yards on seven carries.

“It’s the thing that’s gotten us all year long when we’ve gotten in trouble in football games, is people just lining up that are bigger than we are, and just running right at us,” Boyd said. “And we just have a hard time finding the size to match up with the other teams that are bigger.

“I mean, we’re out there giving 100 percent just like they are. But 270 (pounds) given the same effort is gonna beat 185 (pounds) given the same effort about every time. So it’s just it is what it is,” the coach added.

Northside had some nice attempts on passing situations and almost connected on a long pass play up the middle in the second half when it was forced to try to move the ball and play catch-up. But things just didn’t click and the Panthers were left frustrated by the outcome.

Defensively, the Panthers had to work more than normal because the Barons kept finding ways to extend drives.

Trexler Gray had a season-high 22 tackles while Columbus had 12 and Holden Boykin had eight.

“We just had to take a few chances and it burned us a couple times,” Boyd said. “But all in all, I mean, hats off to Gates County. I mean, they got a good football team physically. I wish them well for the third round.”