UPPER MARLBORO — Throughout the football season each fall, teams from the Southern Maryland Athletic Conference and those from Prince George's County have limited chances to face one another on the gridiron.Â
In six meetings, combining the regular season and postseason, the counties split at 3-3.
On Saturday afternoon at Wise High School, in what might have deemed a veritable rubber match between the best players from both areas, the Prince George's County All-Stars benefited from a trio of turnovers early by the SMAC All-Stars and eventually prevailed in the annual Chick-fil-A Challenge, 35-6.
"Even though it was 35-0 at halftime, the kids never stopped playing hard," said SMAC All-Stars coach Tony Zaccarelli, who is the head coach at Westlake. "We won the second half. It was great having the chance to coach a lot of these kids. For a lot of them, this was going to be their last game anywhere. But they enjoyed the week of practice and they came out here and played hard."
Prince George's opened the scoring just past the midway point of the first quarter when SMAC quarterback Robert Middleton (Lackey) had his pass intercepted and Prince George's started its next drive at the SMAC 27. On the very first play, Quinton Williams (Wise) connected with Ishmael Smith (DuVal) and Isaac Asaiamah (Suitland) made the extra point for a 7-0 lead.
Following another Middleton interception early in the second quarter, Prince George's needed only four plays to go 14 yards. On third down, Williams connected with Daniel Buchanan (Flowers) on a 4-yard strike in the front left corner of the end zone and Asaiamah added another extra point to extend the lead to 14-0.
SMAC failed to generate much offense on its next possession and Prince George's overcame a pair of defensive penalties to pad its lead. This time, Jalon Spencer (Westlake) had his pass intercepted by Mekhi Williams (Flowers) who returned it 53 yards for a touchdown and Asaiamah's extra point extended the hosts advantage to 21-0 with nine minutes left in the half.
Prince George's benefited from two more turnovers later in the second quarter to forge a commanding lead before the intermission.
Julius Duval (Flowers) connected with Smith for 38 yards and, late in the period Williams, found Buchanan for 37 yards on a post pattern to give the hosts a 35-0 lead with 4 seconds left in the half.
"Really, they only put together one drive in the first half," Zaccarelli said. "Most of their success came on our turnovers. We didn't do much offensively in the first half, but our defense hung tough. We gave them a lot of short fields in the first half. But we won the second half [6-0]."
Following a scoreless third quarter, the SMAC squad finally got on the board and ended the Prince George's team's bid for a shutout. Jayson Wilmer (Lackey) provided an immediate spark when he carried five times for 43 yards, then Middleton connected with Malik Lawrence (North Point) in the back right corner of the end zone for a 17-yard scoring strike.
"It was good to come down with the ball and be able to provide some sort of highlight for our team," said Lawrence, who plans to bypass basketball this winter and play baseball for the Eagles this spring. "We had a lot of run this week in practice and it was good playing against a lot of these P.G. schools who we never get to face during the season."
"It was good to be part of that scoring drive," Wilmer said. "I was just hoping to get in there and make some plays. We had fun with other all week. I was practicing with a lot of guys that I played against for four years. We were hoping to come away with a win, but it was fun just being able to compete in another high school game."
