St. Pauls outscores Raiders

by John Lucas | Oct 6, 2021 | Midway

Trey Gregory strides on a 63-yard touchdown run.
(Dunn Area Sports Photo/John Lucas)

Midway’s varsity football team fell, 64-41, in an offensive shootout to visiting Southeastern Athletic 2-A Conference foe St. Pauls in a make-up game on Tuesday night.

“It’s kind of the same thing that happened at Clinton (a 44-35 loss Friday),” said Midway coach Cory Barnes. “We were getting on the board. We were playing some tough defense, but they’re a good football team. They were Eastern champions. They’ve got athletes all over the field. (Kemarion Baldwin) is a good running back. (Eddrick James) is a good running back/wide receiver. Give credit to them for what they do. We’ve got to get tougher up front. That’s been our weakness that we’ve shown the past five days. We played arguably two of the best teams in the East in the past five days and we’ve hung with them. I’m proud of our program for that. I think that’s going to lead to us being a team to be reckoned with once we get to playoff time.”

Junior Trey Gregory ran for 240 yards and four touchdowns on 35 carries and had a seven-yard touchdown reception. Senior Wyatt Holland was 14-of-19 passing for 184 yards and a touchdown, with no interceptions, and ran for 27 yards and a touchdown on 13 carries for the Raiders (4-3, 1-2 SAC).

“Trey’s a good player,” Barnes said. “Because we knew they’re a team that can score and the type of players that they have on offense, we tried to take the air out of the offense a little bit. We were successful running. Trey’s a good running back. He found some grass and hit some holes. Wyatt made some good reads in the running game. We ran the quarterback more tonight. He’s going to be sore tomorrow, too. I can’t ask much more from us offensively. We’ve just got to tighten some things up defensively, especially around the goal line area, and go from there.”

Casey Culbreth had eight receptions for 91 yards and a 10-yard carry. Jamir McCrae had a 52-yard reception. J.P. Luna had a nine-yard reception. Jaylin Baggett had two receptions for 23 yards. Kendrick Tyndall had a two-yard reception.

Senior Mikail Breeden completed 10-of-15 passes for 178 yards and three touchdowns, with one interception, and ran for 76 yards and two touchdowns on five carries and junior Kemarion Baldwin ran for 167 yards and three touchdowns on 12 carries and had a 43-yard reception to lead the Bulldogs (3-0, 1-0).

Midway scored on its opening possession on a three-yard Gregory run, but there was a bad snap on the extra point attempt.

St. Pauls responded by scoring seconds later on a 24-yard Baldwin run. Eddrick James ran for two to give the Bulldogs an 8-6 lead.

Holland ran for a four-yard score and threw to Culbreth for two and, after a Cameron Cousar interception, Gregory ran for a 63-yard score, but the extra point was blocked by Elston Powell, giving the Raiders a 20-8 lead.

But the Bulldogs responded by scoring 24 unanswered points to take a 32-20 lead early in the third quarter.

Midway was unable to cut into the lead, as the teams mainly traded touchdowns the rest of the way.

Midway has a bye on Friday before returning to action Oct. 15 at home against conference opponent West Bladen (2-2, 1-1) for Homecoming.

“We’ve got to take each week one week at a time and we’ve got to finish strong to get in the playoffs and try to make a little push,” Barnes said. “Once we get there, I think our team has shown we can play with the best. We’ve got to keep playing that way to finish conference and hopefully get a good draw in the playoffs.”