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Sports

Chargers Shut Out Lacey in Playoff Opener

Timber Creek got three long touchdowns—one each from their offense, defense and special teams—as they blanked Lacey to advance in the playoffs.

Coming into Friday night's South Jersey Group 3 first-round playoff game against , Lacey Township running back Kyle Spatz had run for 1,093 yards on the season. However, he had yet to meet the ferocious Charger defense.

Even with Timber Creek's star linebacker missing most of the game with an injured ankle, Spatz and the Lions offense failed to make any type of inroads against Timber Creek. The Chargers (9-0) got three long touchdowns in the first half as they shut out Lacey (4-6) 23-0 on Friday night.

The Lions struggled offensively all night long as Spatz was held to 53 yards rushing on 23 carries and only broke one run for more than 10 yards in the game. Run-stuffing defensive tackle was huge in getting to the backfield and slowing Spatz down.

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“When he plays as hard as he can, he's basically unblockable at the high school level,” said Chargers head coach Rob Hinson about Webb.

The Chargers had to contend with playing the entire second half without star linebacker Lambert, who injured his ankle in the second quarter. The Chargers had to depend on players like Khalil Pierce to step up. Pierce, who doesn't normally play linebacker, filled in nicely for Lambert.

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“My coaches just told me to blitz every play,” said Pierce. “We knew we were quicker than them.”

Timber Creek had a 21-0 lead at halftime, thanks to three long scoring plays in the first half. The first of those came late in the opening quarter, when Kevin Potter returned a Lacey punt 57 yards for a touchdown and a 7-0 Charger lead.

The Chargers struck again midway through the second quarter, as Pierce, on just his third carry of the game, broke free from the grasp of two Lion defenders and won an 87-yard footrace to the end zone for a big rushing touchdown. That run accounted for most of Pierce's 111 rushing yards on the evening.

“They're sitting back 20 yards, 12 yards just sitting outside,” said Hinson. "You have to take what they give you and they were giving us running lanes.”

Lacey put together a late second-quarter drive where they got into Charger territory. However, Lions quarterback Tom Kelly, who was just 4-for-16 on the night, got rushed out of the pocket on a third down play and threw an interception to Timber Creek's Andrew Brown. Brown took the ball 79 yards for a huge touchdown that sapped any remaining momentum on the Lacey sideline.

Despite a 23-0 victory, Hinson was unhappy about the lack of execution by his team in the second half. The final 24 minutes of the game were full of penalties, missed blocking assignments and problems with offensive snaps. Hinson told his team about how he was unhappy late-game play.

“[Coach Hinson] basically told us that we didn't execute,” said Dajuan Drennon. “We didn't do anything that we were supposed to do. So we just have to go back to practice on Monday and work on the things that we didn't execute.”

“It was just missed assignments,” said Pierce. “If we make all of our assignments, then we're unstoppable.”

With Lacey seemingly out of the game by the second half, Timber Creek's mistakes ended up not having much of an impact of the final score. But Hinson wanted to get through to his players and warn them those types of mistakes could be costly in the next round.

“We went into a lull in the second half,” said Hinson.“ You can't do that at this level. We need to make sure we play four full quarters of football, not just two.”

The Chargers will look to improve on their sloppy second half next week, when they return home in South Jersey Group 3 semifinals. will host the winner of Friday night's game between Central Regional and Woodrow Wilson. The semifinal game will be played next Friday, Nov. 18 at 7 p.m.

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