ST. PAULS — Aside from the bragging rights, and a win to rebound to close out the regular season, the St. Pauls football team was looking to validate itself on Friday.

With rival Red Springs, who had already clinched at least a share of the Three Rivers Conference title no less, in town, the Bulldogs looked to show that they are of that same caliber after falling short in the second half last week at Whiteville. Behind a senior surge in the second half, St. Pauls did that in the form of a 24-7 win to close out the regular season.

“Coach had told us that one game don’t define us. He said we had to bounce back and this was going to be a big game,” St. Pauls senior running back Marqueise Coleman said. “This was a big night. This was my last ride and it could’ve been my last game out on this field. I wanted to go all out and give it all for my boys.”

Fourteen Bulldogs were celebrating their final regular season home game, with another not promised in the postseason, and that group was the one that found big plays gravitate to them in the second half.

After Red Springs (8-2, 7-1 TRC) took a 7-0 lead into halftime, St. Pauls (8-2, 6-2 TRC) came out in the second half as the aggressor and used early stops on defense and a few scores to change the momentum of the game.

“Our guys are capable of being the conference champs. That’s what we spoke to them about because I felt like Red Springs is the best team we would see this year,” St. Pauls coach Mike Setzer said. “We had to prove to ourself that we belong.”

St. Pauls scored on its first drive of the second half after stopping the Red Devils on their first series of the third quarter when Coleman scampered for a 28-yard touchdown run with 5:04 left in the period. Coleman scored three times in the game to go along with his 206 yards rushing.

After being held to 106 yards last week against Whiteville, and out of the end zone, Coleman took on a Red Springs defense head on in the second half that looked to load the box and slow him down.

“We see them loading the box and that’s what we wanted. The quarterback was booting out so they had to commit to him and that opened me up more and we made some plays happen,” Coleman said.

“We needed to see that out of him going into next week,” Setzer said. “We needed to come out as an offense and say we can execute.”

Coleman’s second score came on a 3-yard dive with 12 seconds left in the third period to give the Bulldogs the lead for good. The senior rushed for 119 yards in the second half.

While Coleman and the Bulldogs offense flourished in the second half, Red Springs was hamstrung by its own mistakes as much as the St. Pauls defense.

“We caused a lot off our problems with too many penalties and too many breakdowns,” Red Springs coach Lawrence Ches said. “They played hard. I can’t take anything away from them.”

Starting quarterback Denym McKeithan suffered a leg injury in the third quarter, leading Ches to insert backup quarterback Hunter Bryant under center. Red Springs run four plays on offense in the fourth quarter after the switch, and the final three plays were turnovers.

Bryant fumbled a pitch to Lee McLean on the second play of the fourth quarter, with senior Anthony Campbell scooping up the loose ball for St. Pauls. The fumble set up Coleman’s final score on a 5-yard run. On the next series, Bryant’s pass was intercepted by senior Emonta Smith that led to a 38-yard field goal from St. Pauls senior Christopher Canuto late in the game to make it 24-7 lead with less than three minutes to go.

The final blow came when Zarron Glover picked off Bryant to close the game on the Red Devils’ first play after the field goal.

“We told the guys to make car crashes. Just hold the ball up and let someone come and finish the tackle,” Glover said of the defense in the second half. “We didn’t keep our heads down (in the first half). We got back out there to do the same thing that we had done before.

“Coach told us to bend but don’t break.”

While St. Pauls was snagging the turnovers in the second half, it was Red Springs coming away with big turnovers in the first half to take the lead into the break. On three straight Bulldog drives to close out the first half, they drove into down-and-goal situations and turned the ball over with Mikail Breeden throwing two picks, one to Traveze Billinger and one to Kevin Bryant, as well as losing a fumble near the goal line.

Despite all that, Setzer tried to keep his team’s morale up despite trailing.

“We told them the game wasn’t over,” he said. “We did a lot of bad things, but we did a lot of good things in the half. I told them that for us to be down 7-0 with the conference champions, we were where we needed to be.”

Red Springs scored in the first half on a 3-yard dive from Jahlil Brunson on the Red Devils first drive of the game.

With the loss, Ches said that the same messages used after the Forest Hills loss will be taken into next week leading up to the state playoffs.

“We’ve got to clean up some mistakes and get some people healthy,” Ches said. “Grow from the loss, that’s what we’ve got to do.”

As the Red Devils regroup, St. Pauls rides the wave of emotions.

“This gives us a high motor. We know that if we play together and play tough through all four quarters that we can compete with anybody,” Coleman said.

Douglas Byrd tops Fairmont

FAIRMONT — The Fairmont football team closed out the regular season with a 6-0 loss at home to Douglas Byrd.

Fairmont (6-5) will wait and see their postseason future tomorrow when the state playoff seedings come out. Douglas Byrd (2-9) closed out the year on a high note.

Jonathan Bym | The Robesonian
The St. Pauls defense mobs Emonta Smith, 21, after his interception in the fourth quarter.
https://www.robesonian.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/web1_IMG_1392.jpgJonathan Bym | The Robesonian
The St. Pauls defense mobs Emonta Smith, 21, after his interception in the fourth quarter.

Jonathan Bym | The Robesonian St. Pauls senior running back Marqueise Coleman looks to turn the corner against Red Springs’ Daylon Hall on Friday in the Bulldogs’ 24-7 win over the Red Devils. In what might be his final home game, Coleman scored three times and rushed for 206 yards.
https://www.robesonian.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/web1_IMG_1418.jpgJonathan Bym | The Robesonian St. Pauls senior running back Marqueise Coleman looks to turn the corner against Red Springs’ Daylon Hall on Friday in the Bulldogs’ 24-7 win over the Red Devils. In what might be his final home game, Coleman scored three times and rushed for 206 yards.
Coleman rushes for 3 TDs in win over Devils

By Jonathan Bym

Sports editor

Jonathan Bym can be reached at 910-816-1977 or by email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @Jonathan_Bym.