North Duplin junior quarterback Luke Kelly accounted for two touchdowns during a 54-0, non-conference routing of Bear Grass Charter Thursday evening. (Heather Best|North Duplin High School)
BEAR GRASS — North Duplin’s offense never stalled during a 54-0, non-conference thrashing of Bear Grass Charter Thursday evening.
The Rebels tallied eight touchdowns, amassed 395 yards of total offense and improved to 3-0 all-time against the Bears.
However, the defense needed a little jump start.
Bear Grass Charter (2-2 overall) recovered the game-opening onside kick and benefited from a couple of North Duplin penalties. Once the Rebels cut out the mistakes, the Bears never found the end zone.
“We started a little unusual when we gave up an onside kick and had a penalty-filled drive where we couldn’t stop shooting ourselves in the foot,” ND head coach Hugh Martin said. “We cleaned that up and got a stop. From that point on, I thought we played well…did a lot of good things.”
North Duplin limited Bear Grass to just 133 yards of total offense.
“Offensively we were OK, I thought, the whole game,” Martin said. “[We’re] understanding better the things we’re trying to do. [We] had several backs who ran the ball extremely well. Dujuan did what he usually does, but had some backs pick up some good yards for us, too.”
Nine Rebels combined for 345 yards and eight touchdowns on 31 totes.
Carell Phillips opened the scoring with a 26-yard, first-quarter run.
Brendan Reyna sparked a 34-point, second-period outburst with a 41-yard TD jaunt.
Senior quarterback Luke Kelly, Armwood and Phillips got into the scoring act from there. Kelly rambled into the end zone from 10 yards out and hooked up with Phillips on a 50-yard scoring strike. The junior quarterback is 5-for-8 with 164 yards and four touchdowns this season.
Armwood scored on runs of 19 and 25 yards. Despite being under the weather, the senior running back torched the Bears’ defense for 107 yards on just six carries.
Ethan Turnage and senior Jonathan Nieves each tallied a second-half touchdown on runs of 27 and five yards, respectively.
Reyna booted four PATs and collected 56 yards on just two carries. Phillips had 54 yards on four attempts, while Zambrano provided 43 yards on six carries and a two-point conversion.
The Rebels (5-1) are off next week.
“We certainly are banged up…several [players] with nagging injuries and sickness going on,” Martin said. “The off week will give us a chance to recover from that and get everyone back to full strength. We had quite a few out a couple of days this past week, so we had to patch things up here and there just to have enough depth in case something happened.
“We’ve played seven straight weeks, including our scrimmage. It takes a toll with a small team where most of your players see time on offense, defense and special teams.”
North Duplin launches its Carolina 1A campaign Sept. 29 at Lakewood. The teams are opening conference play for the 11th consecutive year.
