CARNEYS POINT — Damian Ware had no doubt his Penns Grove football team was in the playoffs even before it took the field for the regular season finale Saturday. The game was just a chance to get back on the winning track, gain a little momentum for the postseason ahead and maybe improve their standing a little.
The Red Devils gave themselves every chance to do all those things, but ultimately they were clipped by Clayton 12-6 when Naeem Smith found the end zone from 8 yards out in overtime.
Penns Grove started the day tied for 13th with Gateway in the South Jersey Group 1 UPR standings, but held the common opponent tiebreaker over the Gators. The Red Devils were a comfortable three points ahead of the first team out, so they never doubted they were playing next week. Ware even thought there was a chance they could even move up when everything got calculated after the completion of Saturday’s games.
A 4:50 p.m. projection had the Red Devils dropping to 14th in the overall UPR and playing at Salem in the opening round. Whoever they play, they’ll go in on a four-game losing streak after starting the season 4-0 one year removed from going winless.
“Our goal was to come in and win and carry some momentum going into the playoffs,” Ware said. “We played a decent game today. Clayton’s a solid team, we played really good defense against them, but I keep telling the kids we keep shooting ourselves in the foot on offense … and that comes with having a young team.
“That’s what we’ve been running into the last few weeks and we’re playing tougher opponents and when you do that you have to be mistake free. We’ve been finding ourselves making too many mistakes in the harder games on drives that are crucial drives.”
Both teams Saturday scored in the second quarter and both team’s defenses stopped the two-point conversion to keep things even through the second half.
Penns Grove struck first when Terrell Thomas went in from the 2 in the first minute of the second quarter. The Clippers tied it 69 seconds before halftime when Smith scored from the 2.
The Red Devils made several defensive stands in the second half to give their offense a chance. Sincere Justo and Maliq Riddick teamed up for a forced fumble and recovery on their 15 to turn back a threat. Reddick sacked quarterback Trevor Rehm and tackled Willie Weathers for a loss on consecutive plays to force the Clippers back from midfield.
“I’m going to be honest, it was looking to the sideline and hearing the coaches calling my name telling me make the play,” Reddick said. “From there, I was just staying focused so I could make the play, that’s all it really was. It was me looking over to the coaches and they guided me to do that, because without that I don’t think it would’ve been that.”
Later, Jerry Wooton had an interception and long return with 2:36 left gave them a chance to win it late in regulation, but a penalty on the return sent them back to midfield and regulation ended at the 40.
“That was definitely a great spot, we just couldn’t get anything consistently going on offense,” Ware said. “We just making bonehead plays at the wrong times and pushing us back further than we need to be.”
Penns Grove went four-and-out with its possession in overtime with Avery Batts overthrowing Savior Allah in the end zone on fourth down. Clayton took over and ran six plays, with Smith determined to end it from the 8. He took a pitch, got to the left corner and made a beeline to the end zone. Smith rushed for 125 yards.
“I trusted my O-line and I know my ability to get in the end zone and we were able to get in the end zone,” he said. “I just wanted to get in the end zone, get the game over with and get ready for the postseason.”
Clayton coach John Chamberlin was confident his team could get it done in overtime. The Clippers will be making their sixth playoff appearance in school history and second in the last five years.
“I felt like we were going to pull it out there,” he said. “We work really hard on our strength and conditioning and when we’re in those overtime periods you always feel confident. We have one of the top defenses in South Jersey in Group 1, so if you can give us a short field I knew we were going to get in offensively but we were definitely confident in our defense getting a stop today.”
One of the subplots to the game was the bid of Penns Grove’s Jaivon Thomas to become a 1,000-yard rusher as a freshman. The Clippers held Thomas to 54 yards rushing and he now needs 89 yards to become the county’s third 1,000-yard rusher this season. Schalick’s Kenny Bartee and Salem’s Cashmir Parsley reached the milestone each of the last two weeks.
“My goal was to come out here and win, get my 1,000 yards and celebrate,” Thomas said. “That was my goal for today, but fell short. But we’ll be back next week to shock the world.”
Clayton 12, Penns Grove 6
| CLAY | PG | |
| 12 | 1st Downs | 5 |
| 43-183 | Rushing | 33-66 |
| 3-5-1 | Passes | 2-9-0 |
| 14 | Passing | 64 |
| 3-1 | Fum-Lost | 1-0 |
| 3-33.0 | Punts-Avg | 6-31.6 |
| 2-10 | Penalties | 7-59 |
| Clayton | 0 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 6- | 12 |
| Penns Grove | 0 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 0- | 6 |
SCORING SUMMARY
PG-Terrell Thomas 2 run (kick failed), 11:08 2Q
C-Naeem Smith 2 run (run failed), 1:09 2Q
C-Naeem Smith 8 run (no PAT), OT