By Jed Lockett
ATHENS — Friday morning, PikeView coach Jeff Damewood watched the school’s girls soccer team make history with their first appearance in the state tournament. Friday night, he presided over some more history for the school.
Ben Nester ran for 126 yards and four touchdowns and threw for another score as PikeView clinched its first playoff berth since 1996 with a resounding 68-14 win over Midland Trail at Callaghan Stadium.
“It feels great to finally know that we’re going instead of hoping and wishing and knowing we had to win tonight,” Damewood said. “It’s been a long time. Most of the fans and most of the kids, I don’t know if any of them have been around or remember the old teams that went to the playoffs.
“We talked about the early teams at PikeView and how they’ve won and we wanted to get us back there. Now that we’re there, we’ve got to focus on next week and trying to get a win in the playoffs.”
“They’re just a good football team,” Midland Trail coach Joe Dean said. “My hat’s off to them. I wish them well in the playoffs. They played a good, hard game. They’re a fine team.”
All of Nester’s yardage and scoring, including his eight-yard scoring pass to Brandon Flinchum, took place in the first quarter and allowed the Panthers to take a 35-0 lead after the opening period.
“He got sick today and had about a 101 temperature, 102 temperature. Probably about an hour before the game it hit him,” Damewood said. “He came out and played like a champ. They had a hard time stopping him.”
Nester left the game after that and it allowed David Keen to make his impact. First he got a trifecta with a sack, forced fumble and a 15-yard touchdown return on the same play. Then he dashed 26 yards for another second-quarter touchdown.
“David Keen plays solid defense for us,” Damewood said. “That’s his second return touchdown fumble recovery. He’s a great player.”
The Panthers gained 271 total yards in the first half and held the 0-10 Patriots to minus-3 and forced three turnovers.
“Defense played tough,” Damewood said. “We focus on that and I can’t say enough. All year defense has been our foundation. We hit people. We gang tackle well. Next week we’re going to have some competition. I hope we bring our ‘A’ game.”
PikeView (7-3) now waits to see who it will play in the first round of the state playoffs.
“We’re going to go about it the same way we go about every week,” Damewood said. “We’re going to get the film, review the film, practice is going to be the same. We don’t want to change things. We want to keep things the same routine and hopefully show up with an ‘A’ game.”
— E-mail: jlockett@bdtonline.com
