Saraland’s C.D. Gill looks for room after catching a pass from K.J. Lacey during the Spartans’ 42-3 win over Chelsea Thursday night in the first round of the Class 6A playoffs. Gill caught two touchdown passes and had four receptions for 128 yards. (Todd Stacey/Call News)
Saraland quarterback K.J. Lacey lets go of a pass Thursday night during a 42-3 win over Chelsea in the first round of the Class 6A playoffs. Lacey was 12-of-24 passing for 291 yards and four touchdowns. (Todd Stacey/Call News)
Saraland’s DeShawn Spencer pulls away from a Chelsea defender Thursday night. Spencer had five catches for 132 yards and a touchdown. (Todd Stacey/Call News)
Saraland defensive lineman Antonio Coleman hits a Chelsea ballcarrier Thursday night. It was the second straight game the Spartans held the opposition without a touchdown. (Todd Stacey/Call News)
By JIMMY WIGFIELD
SARALAND — Unranked and unheralded Chelsea hoarded the football for 30½ minutes Thursday night to slow the game and force No. 1-ranked Saraland to put its hands in its pockets. The unbeaten and unruffled Spartans did just that but only to search for a match to light the next fuse.
It was time of possession against time for aggression and Saraland, which had the ball for only 17½ minutes, nevertheless exterminated the Hornets 42-3 in the first round of the Class 6A state playoffs Thursday night.
K.J. Lacey completed 12 of 24 passes for 291 yards and four touchdowns, including an 80-yard bomb to C.D. Gill on the first play, on the way to an overwhelming victory that provided the Spartans (10-0) with a couple of noteworthy achievements at the state level.
It was their 31st straight home victory, the longest streak in Alabama, and they became the only team in the state to win at least 10 games in each of the last seven seasons. Mars Hill can also do it if it wins in the first round Friday night.
“Heck, when you start looking at 10 wins for seven years in a row, that’s sustained excellence and that starts from the top down from the administration,” said Saraland coach Jeff Kelly, whose 59-8 record in the last five years is also the best in Class 6A. “That’s a program thing and I’m really proud of that. We’ve got a lot of pride in that and our coaches do a great job.”
Kelly insists that his players perform with a sense of urgency.
“We’ve won because we’ve had a lot of outstanding young men that are talented at football that love the game of football,” he said. “It ain’t no secret sauce that we’re doing. There’s talented teams, there’s good teams, that have days off that don’t play and our guys, over the years, they come to play each and every Friday night. Having a letdown hasn’t happened a whole lot. Our kids show up to play.”
And play fast, because the last thing Kelly wants is for his offense to appear to be playing checkers. The elapsed time on the Spartans’ scoring possessions Thursday night — it’s hardly accurate to categorize most of them as drives — was 14 seconds, 11 seconds, 54 seconds, 78 seconds and 132 seconds. One lasted an interminable 4:52 over 75 yards and 12 plays, causing Kelly’s goatee to grow grayer and longer.
At Saraland, having a 21-0 lead in the first quarter and a 21-3 halftime lead could be reason for sober reflection or to lift the hood and see if something is choking the carburetor.
“I feel like we didn’t play to our best,” Lacey said. “We came back locked in in the second half.”
Lacey, the four-star senior who has committed to Texas, now has 9,895 career yards and 120 touchdowns, leaving him 105 yards short of becoming the 10thquarterback in state history to reach 10,000 yards.
On the first play, Lacey was greeted with a sight any quarterback savors — base coverage and, based on film study, what he knew would be a choice between two open receivers. Operating from an empty backfield, he detected Gill sprinting down the hash marks for an 80-yard TD pass but Gill dropped three other passes that could have been touchdowns, including one that bounced off his shoulder pads in the end zone.
“We saw on film they ran the base coverage all the way coming through,” Lacey said. “I saw it was going to be Shawn Shawn (DeShawn Spencer) or C.D. He was wide open going down the seam.”
Gill — one of the state’s best receivers at gaining separation and yards after the catch — exhibited the Spartan standard afterward when analyzing the rare dropped passes: “I guess it’s just not executing when it all comes down to it. But we hopped right back into it and kept our foot on the pedal.”
Gill executed well enough to make four catches for 128 yards and two touchdowns and Spencer, who had 132 yards on five catches, helped make up for the absence of injured receiver and Ole Miss commitment Dillon Alfred.
The drops and Lacey’s interception on a deflected pass kept the Hornets (6-5) in the game, trailing 21-3 at halftime, but Lacey’s 55-yarder to Spencer on a slant on the Spartans’ third play of the second half and Santae McWilliams’ 29-yard TD run on the next series eradicated any hopes Chelsea had of keeping the game close.
“I really thought our defense played well in the first half,” said Hornets coach Todd Cassity, whose team finished the season with five straight losses after a 6-0 start. “They got a couple of big plays but when they’ve got a 4.4 guy going against a 4.9 guy, sometimes that happens.”
At halftime, Kelly told his players to relax.
“I told them that we’ve played a lot of good ball here,” he said. “We’ve got a lot of good ballplayers in here. And we’ve just got to continue to do what we’re doing. And if we make a play, great. If we make a mistake, great. Either of those scenarios, you’ve got to play the next play. I don’t want anything to affect our approach on the next play.”
Lacey also threw a 25-yard scoring pass to Gill in the second quarter after Arterus Moffett recovered a high pooch kick late in the first half. McWilliams caught an 8-yard TD pass from Lacey and ran for 88 yards on 12 carries, including a 2-yard scoring run.
Just for fun, Lacey targeted star defensive lineman Antonio Coleman — in at tight end and taking a few plays off from whipping blockers and fitting running backs for body bags — for what would have been a short scoring pass early in the fourth quarter. But Coleman caught it, then bobbled it, although the referees had a hard time seeing if he controlled it with the celebratory lights dimming and brightening. On the next play, McWilliams followed Coleman’s blocking off right tackle for the touchdown.
Kelly said having two weeks off before the playoffs began was beneficial but affected his team’s momentum.
“When you’re playing well, a lot of times a bye week is not what the doctor ordered,” he said. “A lot of times, you want to keep playing. And I thought there were times in the first half where we were just a little bit rusty. But we have a lot of faith in our guys. I said, ‘Hey, we’re going to keep feeding you guys. We’re going to keep throwing it. We ain’t changing what we’re doing, so just settle in there and play.’”
Saraland went on to show why it has the No. 2 offense and No. 2 defense in Class 6A. It has scored 30-plus points in 36 of its last 40 games, hasn’t allowed a touchdown in the last two games and has a +11 turnover ratio — all despite losing its offensive line, two-time Mr. Football Ryan Williams and 10 defensive starters.
“We heard all offseason, ‘You know, you graduated 10 guys on defense. You graduated all your offensive line. You’re going to struggle to go .500. Who’s going to replace all the guys?’” Kelly said. “And we’re playing as good a defense as we’ve played here in years and it’s a credit to (defensive coordinator) coach (Brett) West, our defensive coaches and our players. Our players are playing with great effort. We’ve really got a lot of underclassmen out there that are flying to the ball and doing a lot of really good things. They’re one of the reasons that we’re where we’re at.”
Coleman, who has committed to Auburn, said all the new starters quickly meshed.
“I just love everything that’s going on,” he said. “We’ve got great chemistry. For them to be young guys, we’ve got great everything, great leadership all around. The young guys are stepping up. Everything is falling in place for us.”
The Spartans’ defense has allowed only 100 points in 10 games after allowing 133 during the same span last season.
“We’ve proven we’re better than people thought and we’re going to continue to keep proving that,” Coleman said. “Like coach Kelly said, one game at a time. That’s what we live by.”
Chelsea rushed for 168 yards, 91 yards more than Saraland’s average, but 53 came on a fake punt and run by Jack Flowers in the second quarter — technically against the special teams, not the defense — to set up Luke Miller’s 23-yard field goal. Another 99 came against the Spartans’ backups in the fourth quarter.
Cassity said Saraland won the game at the line of scrimmage.
“We try to play power football a little bit and they were a little bit more powerful than we were up front,” he said. “(Coleman) is a heck of a player. They’ve got good players everywhere and we’re just trying to play old-school football with kids from Chelsea.”
The Spartans host McAdory or visit Wetumpka in the second round.
