‘It’s a dynasty, baby’: Central completes threepeat for Dade County record 8th state title
Miami Central is no longer just the new powerhouse in Miami-Dade County.
It’s now the premier program, perhaps in all of Florida.
With a 42-14 rout of Merritt Island in the Class 5A championship Friday in Fort Lauderdale, Central now stands alone in Dade County with eight state championships, breaking a tie with archrival Northwestern for the most in county history and they did it by capping off a second three-peat in the last decade.
“It’s a dynasty, baby,” coach Roland Smith said.
There’s no other way to put it.
Before 2010, the Rockets had never won a state title. Now only three other schools have more.
They’ve won eight state championships in the last 12 seasons, including four in a row from 2012-2014 and now three straight from 2019-2021. No one has more state titles since 2010 and, right now, Central seems to be better than ever.
In this three-peat, all three of the Rockets’ wins have come by at least 35 points. After losing its first two games of the season, Central (12-2) won its final 12 by an average of 31.4 points per game, with only one game decided by less than 13 and only two decided by less than 25, and six of its seven touchdowns Friday were scored by players with at least one season remaining.
The Rockets, who are ranked No. 19 in the nation by MaxPreps, will go into the 2022 season with national-championship aspirations to go along with their expectation to win four in a row.
“We’re a program. That’s what we call ourselves,” Smith said. “We’re not a football team. We are a program and when you come to Miami Central this is the expectation.”
He knows the South Florida standard better than anyone. He was a junior varsity coach for the Bulls in 1995 when they won the first of their seven state titles and he guided them to another as coach in 2007. Telly Lockette, who was Smith’s offensive coordinator at Northwestern and is now the running backs coach for the Marshall Thundering Herd, led the Rockets to their first two state titles in 2010 and 2012 before Smith took over in 2013. He built on what Lockette started and turned Central into one of the most dominant dynasties in the state.
“We just want to set the standard,” quarterback Keyone Jenkins said.
This season began with legitimate national-title aspirations, too. They faded in the first three weeks of the season, though, when the Rockets lost to St. John Bosco in Bellflower, California, and Las Vegas’ Bishop Gorman in Naples and lost Jenkins to a finger injury, which kept him from starting again until the playoffs began.
It was “heartbreaking,” Smith said.
“Whenever my team goes out, we go out to represent our community,” Smith said. “I want to do it for South Florida.”
After those losses, Central has been the juggernaut it expects to be.
Its championship win was a microcosm of its whole season. The Rockets started slow and were in real danger of going into halftime tied 14-14 before three touchdowns in 2:07 — including a pair of pick sixes — gave them a commanding 35-7 lead at the half.
With less than four minutes left in the second quarter, the Mustangs (13-2) blocked a punt and took over at Central’s 6-yard line, down 14-7. On the second play of the drive, defensive back Joshisa Trader intercepted Merritt Island quarterback Brady Denaburg and returned it 90 yards for a touchdown to put the Rockets up 21-7 with 3:12 left in the half. Star wide receiver Lamar Seymore, who’s orally committed to the Miami Hurricanes, caught a 37-yard touchdown from quarterback Dylan Tulloch with 1:23 left in the half and Trent Henry finished off the eruption on the next play from scrimmage when he returned another interception 60 yards for a touchdown.
“We came out to a pretty slow start,” said star linebacker Wesley Bissainthe, who signed with Miami on Wednesday. “Our coaches stay on top of us. We woke up.”
Central triggered a running clock with 8:35 left in the third quarter when Jenkins, who now splits time with Tulloch, connected with Trader for a 57-yard touchdown pass on a flea flicker. The Rockets spent the rest of the second half celebrating in front of a mostly friendly crowd of 3,980 at DRV PNK Stadium.
Trader, who also starts at wide receiver, finished with three touchdowns — two on offense and one on defense — and had four catches for 116 yards. Jenkins threw two touchdowns, ran for another and went 6 of 7 for 176 yards and running back Ean Pope added 86 yards and a touchdown on five carries.
All three will still be in high school next year, as will Seymore and Tulloch.
A three-peat is great. A four-peat is even better.
Both of those have been done, though. The Rockets are still chasing that first national championship and Jenkins didn’t shy away when he was asked about it after Central’s latest win.
“Yeah, definitely,” he said. “Can’t lose no more.”
This story was originally published December 17, 2021 at 4:00 PM.
