Ohio State commit Fletcher leads American Heritage’s rout of California powerhouse
Ohio State head coach Ryan Day and his staff must have been salivating watching Saturday afternoon’s national telecast featuring Plantation American Heritage.
They probably wish they could have running back Mark Fletcher on their team right now. But they’ll have to wait until 2023. Fletcher, a 4-star running back, rated No. 11 in the country by 247 Sports and a Buckeye commit since last April, is still running the ball for the Patriots for one more season.
Mike Smith made his head coaching debut on Saturday and watched with delight as his star back led the Patriots to a 56-27 rout of Los Alamitos (Ca.), the second of three games in the Broward Showcase Series at St. Thomas Aquinas broadcast live on ESPN2.
Fletcher finished the day with 222 yards on 20 carries and two touchdowns as the Patriots, ranked preseason No. 19 by Max Preps, dusted a Los Alamitos team ranked No. 25.
And Fletcher could have finished with even more had he not been pulled early in the second half. His 74-yard run on the third play of the second half set up a 3-yard scoring toss from Blake Murphy to Malachi Toney giving the Pats a 35-14 lead. It would be the last time Fletcher touched the ball.
When Murphy scored on a 32-yard quarterback option keeper on the next possession to make it 42-14, Smith decided that was enough from his star back as both teams battled the mid-afternoon searing temperatures.
“Just a great all-around team win today and a great atmosphere to play in front of all these fans on national TV,” Fletcher said. “To play the way we did, it’s all good. All the credit to the guys (O-line) up front. They put in so much work and work as hard as any of us. I owe it all to them, they give me the big holes to run behind and I just hit it. We’ll enjoy this one for 24 hours and then it’s on to business next week. We’ve got big plans this season.”
Big plans indeed. After the game, Smith talked at length about how last year’s regional final loss at home to Miami Central has resonated and driven his team during the offseason after he took over the head job when Patrick Surtain left to join Mike McDaniel’s staff with the Dolphins.
“I’ve got a special group of kids here and a special group of coaches as well,” Smith said. “I really believe we’ve got something special here. I’ve been here for all five state championships and I see something different in this group in how focused they are. By the end of the week, you could tell, they were going crazy with ‘coach we’ve had enough of practice, let us go play’ and they really went out there and played today. I’ve got 25 seniors making my job look pretty easy right now and with the way things ended last year (the Central loss) it really left a bad taste in our mouths. Since the season ended that night, these kids have been locked in and preparing for moments like today.”
With Fletcher leading the way, the Patriots took control early.
After the defense forced a quick Los Alamitos three-and-out to start the game, Heritage marched 80 yards in 10 plays to take a 7-0 lead. Fletcher carried the ball on eight of those plays and accounted for 62 of those yards, capping things off with a 16-yard scoring run.
Heritage linebacker David Vadala gave his team a short field on the next drive when he recovered a Los Alamitos fumble and returned it to the Griffins 25.
Once again it was Fletcher getting the bulk of the work carrying three of the four plays on the drive before going over from a yard out to make it 14-0 Patriots with 4:52 left in the first.
After Los Alamitos, led by the quarterback/receiver combination of Malachi Nelson and Makai Lemon, both USC commits, sliced the the lead in half with a 5-yard touchdown pass late in the first quarter, the Patriots stretched the lead back to 14 again when Murphy found five-star wide receiver Brandon Inniss, another Ohio State commit, for a 25-yard score.
Heritage increased its lead to 28-7 with 2:31 to go in the first half on a Byron Louis 1-yard plunge before the Griffins put a late drive together, running back Ivrick Carrigan scoring from a yard out just eight seconds before halftime.
This story was originally published August 27, 2022 at 8:28 PM.