No. 5 St. Thomas Aquinas bullies Dillard in rivalry game to seize control of district

St. Thomas Aquinas’ meetings with Dillard are always intense and this year the rivalry showdown had added stakes.

The Raiders and Panthers share District 11-3M, and both sides know their game Friday might just be the first of two. Both are top-100 teams in the country, according to MaxPreps, and one of the two Fort Lauderdale powerhouses will be the favorite to at least get to the Class 3M championship.

With a 24-6 win at Dillard High School’s Otis Gray Jr. Memorial Stadium, St. Thomas Aquinas proved it’s still the team to beat.

“We wanted to show we were more dominant,” Raiders quarterback Hezekiah Harris said. “That was kind of the goal coming in this week.”

It wasn’t just the victory, but also how St. Thomas Aquinas (6-0) did it. The No. 5 Raiders ran for 272 yards on 35 carries, and had two running backs run for at least 100 yards. They also scored 24 unanswered to end the game after the star running back Christopher Johnson scored a touchdown for the Panthers (2-3) on their opening drive.

Star running back Gemari Sands opened the game as St. Thomas Aquinas’ featured tailback, and he ran eight times for 100 yards, setting up the Raiders for a chip-shot field goal on their second drive with three carries for 76 yards.

From there, star running back Jordan Lyle took over and he ran 16 times for 117 yards, with one touchdown right before halftime to send the Raiders into the break with a 17-6 lead.

Harris added six carries for 41 yards—including sacks—and also went 9 of 17 for 118 yards and two touchdowns as a passer.

“We knew we were going to run the ball on them. ... We knew we were going to dominate them since the beginning of the game when we see that the first couple runs were working,” Lyle said. “Everybody’s ready to play. All our running backs are ready to play. One goes down, the next comes up and we’re cheering each other on. It’s a brotherhood over here.”

Said St. Thomas Aquinas coach Roger Harriott: “We have a very selfless team.”

The run game set up the pass, too, and Harris hit on back-to-back 33-yard passes to star wide receiver Chance Robinson in the fourth quarter to sew up the win.

Harris, who also threw the go-ahead touchdown to star wide receiver Isaiah Hardge in the second quarter, launched one pass to Robinson on a post to push the Raiders into Dillard territory and then fired another bomb up to the junior on the very next play to put St. Thomas Aquinas up 24-6 with 7:58 left.

A few plays later, the Raiders picked off Armani Norcius — they also sacked the Panthers quarterback four times and held Johnson to just 8 rushing yards — to seize control of the district.

Although St. Thomas Aquinas didn’t officially clinch 11-3M this week, Dillard was the Raiders’ fiercest competition for the crown as the No. 94 team in the nation.

“Our goal,” Harris said, “was to show these guys we were a dominant front.”