Homestead football secures potential springboard victory by rallying to beat Columbus
Almost a year ago, Homestead’s football team picked up a signature victory over Miami Northwestern which sparked them on a historic run to its first state championship game appearance.
The Broncos hope they started something similar on Saturday night.
Homestead put together what it felt was its best performance to date this season during a 32-16 victory over reigning Class 4M state champion and previously unbeaten Miami Columbus at Tropical Park.
The Broncos (4-1), who opened the season with a one-point loss to Miami Palmetto, hope the victory will have a similar effect as last year when their win over Northwestern began a six-game winning streak that carried them all the way to the Class 3M final.
“This is the year,” Homestead quarterback Joshua Townsend said. “Palmetto caught us early in the season, and we needed that and I feel like this was the push that’s gonna show we got this.”
The Broncos called the victory over Columbus the first game on their “revenge tour” as they hope to avenge their two regular season defeats last season which came against the Explorers and Miami Southridge.
Homestead will take on Southridge on Friday at Harris Field at 7:30 p.m. in a game that could decide the eventual District 16-3M champion.
Townsend missed those games last season with an injury, but returned to help Homestead beat Northwestern.
Townsend completed 11 of 21 passes for 193 yards and threw two touchdown passes on Saturday to receiver Cortez Mills, who caught both scores and finished with five catches for 78 yards.
Townsend and Mills showed a chemistry between quarterback and receiver that has flourished over their high school careers at Homestead.
“Me and Cortez, we’re like Wifi, we’re always connected,” Townsend said.
Mills added: “Me and Josh have been working real hard all offseason and we’ve got this down pat. He took the shots and I made the plays.”
But it was Homestead’s defense that shut down Columbus.
The Broncos intercepted Columbus quarterback Alberto Mendoza four times and sacked him four times. Mendoza completed 19 of 30 passes for 169 yards and threw two touchdowns.
Santonio Wallace finished with one of those interceptions and one of those sacks. Clinton Riley, Sir Robertgeau and Eduardo Nunez came up with the other interceptions.
“This team is like a family and when defense and special teams make plays, we feed off each other and offense makes the big plays,” Homestead coach Ron Thornton said. “There was some trash talking on social media this week and they were saying they ‘ruled the south’ so that fueled our kids.”
After Columbus (6-1) jumped out to a 10-0 lead with 10:23 left in the second quarter, the Broncos’ defense did not allow another point until Mendoza hit Benjamin Blackburn for a 6-yard touchdown.
That was when Homestead running back and Louisville commit Isaac Brown sparked the comeback on special teams.
Brown, who returned after missing a couple of games due to injury, bobbled the ball trying to field it at his own 1-yard line, but then picked it up and found an opening down the sideline and sped 99 yards for the score.
Brown would score two more touchdowns in the fourth quarter from 5 and 48 yards to put the game out of reach. Brown finished with 122 yards on 15 carries.
“Isaac Brown is a Swiss army knife, he can do it all,” Thornton said. “He’s a great team player and he embraces his role and how to be utilized every way that can help his team.”
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This story was originally published October 7, 2023 at 11:59 PM.
