By Steve Carter
TIFTON — A common refrain from Tift County High head football coach Jay Walls following Blue Devil football games during the 2006 season has been, “Our defense really stepped it up for us tonight.”
On the year, the Devils have given up 2,626 yards, an average of 218.8 per contest. Tift has allowed 1,483 yards passing and 1,143 yards on the ground.
Teams have rushed 345 times against Tift as the Devils have allowed an average of 3.3 yards per carry.
When Tift hosts the North Gwinnett Bulldogs Friday night in the third round of the state Class AAAAA playoffs, the Devils could face one of their biggest challenges of the year.
Sophomore quarterback Michael Tamburo leads a North Gwinnett offense that has put up 1,968 yards through the air and 1,561 yards on the ground. That is a total of 3,529 yards and an average of 294.1 yards per contest. If you want to look at it another way, the Bulldogs’ 3,529 yards gives them just over two miles of total offense.
Tamburo has accounted for a lot of that yardage as he has thrown for 1,946 yards and has run for 414. His favorite receiver has been Ryan McDaniel, who has 68 catches for 924 yards. The catches are a Gwinnett County school record.
While a sophomore leads the North offense, the leading tackler for the Tift County defense is another 10th grader, linebacker Josh Abbott.
The sophomore leads the team with 103 total stops, including 68 solos. He also has two passes broken up, two caused fumbles and one interception.
Senior linebacker Jeffery Searcy is the team’s second leading tackler with 94 total stops. He also has six sacks, three caused fumbles, one fumble recovery and one interception.
Searcy has only played in 11 of Tift’s 12 games after missing the season opener with a knee injury.
Tift’s defense will get a boost this week as strong safety Jay Gaskins and lineman Tobias Walker are both “probable” for the North Gwinnett game, Walls said Tuesday. Gaskins missed the first two games of the state playoffs with a knee injury, while Walker missed last week’s 38-23 win over Union Grove with an ankle problem.
Gaskins has 69 total tackles on the year and leads the team with five interceptions. Walker has 23 total tackles and three sacks.
While the Tift defense will try to slow down the Bulldog offense, the Blue Devils will go in to Friday’s contest on a roll having put up 766 yards in the team’s two playoff games. That includes a 433-yard performance in the win over Union Grove.
Junior running back Kaream Hess has rushed for 1,152 yards and has caught 43 passes for 368 yards.
Senior wide receiver Israel Troupe has 55 catches for 605 yards, 17 rushes for 114 yards, seven kickoff returns for 175 yards and 12 punt returns for 109 yards.
After passing for 333 yards against Union Grove, senior quarterback Sean Baxley now has completed 172 of his 265 passes for 1,747 yards. He has thrown 16 touchdown passes and has been intercepted 11 times.
Tift has rushed for 1,382 yards and has thrown for 1,784 more yards in 2006. That is a total of 3,166 yards and an average of 263.8 per contest.
North Gwinnett will try to slow down the Devils with a defense led by linebacker Chris Knox.
The senior linebacker leads the Bulldogs with 108 total tackles, eight and 1/2 sacks and 14 and 1/2 tackles for loss yardage.
Junior lineman Eric Eberhardt has 89 total tackles, 12 and 1/2 sacks and 19 tackles for loss yardage.
Another junior, linebacker Eloka Anyaorah, has 81 total tackles, three and 1/2 sacks and 16 and 1/2 tackles for loss yardage.
North Gwinnett is one of three teams from Region 7-AAAAA still alive in the state playoffs and Bulldogs head coach Bob Sphire told the Gwinnett Daily Post this week that his squad, Norcross and Peachtree Ridge all share quality defenses.
“The thing you have in all the (7-AAAAA) teams that are left, first and foremost, is that they all play solid defense,” Sphire said. “Every time they step out on the field they’ve got a chance to compete because the defense puts them in the game.”
Game time is 8 p.m. Friday at Brodie Field.
The Tift-North Gwinnett winner will face off against the Houston County-Roswell victor at 6 p.m. Dec. 9 at the Georgia Dome in one state semifinal. The other semifinal game will be played at 9 p.m. that day and will pit the winners of the Peachtree Ridge-Stephenson and Norcross-Warner Robins third round contests against each other.
