Raiders Trounce Panthers in Opener

By Mike Zima, Correspondent

ORANGE PARK - Orange Park High freshman defensive tackle Caleb Fields spearheaded a swarming Orange Park defense as the Raiders shut out host Ridgeview 26-0 in the season opener for both teams on August 23.
Fields had two tackles for loss, recovered a fumble for a touchdown, made an interception, and forced a fumble that squelched Ridgeview’s only scoring threat. He was continuously in the face of Ridgeview quarterbacks Jack Buchholz and Treyvon Tyrone, batting down two passes.
“He is not so huge, but he plays hard, he tries to learn the game and he has a good football IQ,” Orange Park head coach Marcus Wimberly said of the 210-pound Fields. “As he gets stronger, he is going to be something to deal with.”
Fields scored the game’s first touchdown— and the only points the Raiders needed—as part of a bizarre sequence of plays halfway through the first quarter that decided the game. Orange Park was poised to break a scoreless tie when Daniel Richardson fumbled after gaining 17 yards on a slant pattern. The ball was recovered by Ridgeview safety Camryn Hall at the five-yard line. After the Raiders’ Jayden Blanton and Rory Childs pushed Ridgeview back four yards with tackles for losses, Buchholz and running back Christian Felder could not execute a handoff, and the ball fell to the turf in the end zone. A penetrating Fields was there to pounce on it for the game’s first points.
Ridgeviewup man Lucious Harris fielded the ensuing kickoff and ran laterally to his left. While being brought down by two Raiders, he tried to lateral the ball forward to Felder. The pitch was intercepted by Orange Park’s Emani Justavino and returned 10 yards to the Panthers 17 yard line. On the next play, Raiders quarterback Gabe Taylor faked a handoff to Austee’n Mills, who took most of the Ridgeview defense in his direction. Taylor pulled the ball out of Mills’ belly, ran up the middle, faked out one safety and crashed through the other, falling across the goal line.
The Raiders had scored twice in 22 seconds, and though both of Luke Obermeyer’s extra point attempts failed, the 12-0 lead was more than enough.
There was no further scoring in the first half, thanks to the Orange Park defense which held the Panthers to minus one yard of total offense and only one first down. The results were even more impressive considering that the Raiders returned only three starters from last year’s defense.
“Defense always comes along faster than the offense does,” said Wimberly. “‘Keep it simple, stupid,’ is a kids’ phrase, and we try to keep it simple. So we did a little zone blitzing, but for the most part, it was the same thing over and over.”
The Orange Park offense was not perfect but generated enough scoring punch to put the game away. The Raiders drove inside the Ridgeview 30-yard line three times in the first half, twice reaching the five-yard line, but had two touchdowns nullified by penalties and did not score on any of those possessions. On their second possession of the second half, Orange Park marched 53 yards in seven plays, all on the ground. Dylon Ruiz carried four straight times to move the ball inside the Panthers’ 10-yard line. From the three, wingback James Waters sealed off the defensive end and Damar Jackson ran inside of the block for an easy score. Obemeyer added the PAT, giving the Raiders a 19-0 lead with 6:17 remaining in the third quarter. Wimberly complimented Ruiz and Jackson and said that the Raiders wanted to emphasize the running game after the prior failures to finish drives.
“Taylor was missing a few reads in the first half,” said Wimberly. “That is why we started running the ball a little bit more, to try to get him settled down. We moved it and some other things came open, the play-action game and that type of stuff.”
Ruiz and Jackson combined for 134 yards on 15 rushes, almost nine yards per carry.
Orange Park converted the fifth Ridgeview turnover into the final points. Treyvon Tyrone, who had replaced Buchholz at quarterback in the third quarter, failed to handle a shotgun snap at the Panthers’ 19-yard line, where the ball was recovered by Raiders linebacker Justin Davis. Taylor converted a third and 17 with a rollout pass to Waters that gained 23 yards. Three straight quarterback sneaks brought the ball to the one-yard line. An unnecessary roughness penalty on Ridgeview’s Harris and Chuckie Mendat, who had stood Taylor up shy of the goal line but then threw him to the ground after the whistle blew, resulted in a new set of downs for the Raiders. On the next play, Taylor easily scored on another sneak. Obemeyer added the extra point for the game’s final margin with 2:15 left in the third quarter.
Ridgeview did find some offense in the second half with the insertion of Tyrone at quarterback. The senior was a threat with his legs and ended up as Ridgeview’s leading rusher with 38 yards on 11 carries. He led the Panthers on their only sustained drive of the evening, a 73-yard, 10-play march that earned five first downs and reached the Orange Park seven-yard line. The drive stalled when Fields gained penetration and put his shoulder pad into Tyrone’s midsection, jarring the ball loose. Fellow defensive tackle Jayden Blanton, who himself had two tackles for losses, recovered the ball for the Raiders at the nine-yard line.
Merlin Smith, making his debut as the Ridgeview head coach, was pleased with Tyrone’s work.
“To take advantage of the looks they were giving us, we needed someone to come in who was able to run the ball, like a third running back,” Smith said. “He came in and gave us a spark.”
For Class 4A Ridgeview, the problem was not the defense, which gave up a modest 268 total yards and 10 first downs. But turnovers resulted in a touchdown and allowed Orange Park to begin two scoring drives inside the red zone. Smith cited the five turnovers and 14 penalties that cost the Panthers 98 yards. Ridgeview was even penalized 15 yards for failing to take the field in time for the mandatory three-minute warm-up period at the end of the halftime break.
“We made a lot of mistakes and were shooting ourselves in the foot,” Smith said. “The turnovers killed our drives and momentum. That’s what turnovers do.”
Smith said that the Panthers will try to clean things up and work on their passing game before they take the field again at West Nassau on August 30.
The Class 5A Raiders face a much stiffer challenge on August 30, hosting Oakleaf in a battle of Clay County neighbors.
“We just have to eliminate mistakes and execute,” said Wimberly. “We played a very tough preseason classic (at Mandarin) to get ready for this game.”