Howard and Atholton went back and forth in an entertaining Howard County football contest on Friday night and the host Lions rallied with a pair of fourth quarter touchdowns to pull out an exciting 32-28 victory.
Brady Curley scored the winning touchdown for Howard with a one yard run with less than a minute to play in the contest, capping an 80-yard drive. Earlier in the quarter, the Lions scored on a one yard run by Joey Bonavitacola.
Howard also scored first in the game when Zach Price found the end zone in the opening quarter, again from one yard away. Atholton, however, scored twice in the second quarter, as quarterback Brian MacMahon completed touchdown passs to Adam D’Amico (3 yards) and Dequan Ellison (10 yards), to take a 14-7 halftime lead.
The Raiders grew their lead early in the third quarter when Andrew King broke loose for a 64-yard touchdown run and a 21-7 lead.
At that point, the Howard offense got on track. Bonavitacola scored on a six-yard run and Ryan Wade completed a 69-yard TD pass to Dequan Ellison. The Lions failed on both extra-point attempts and trailed 21-19.
King closed the third quarter with another long touchdown run for Atholton, this time covering 69 yards, sending the Raiders to the final quarter with a 28-19 advantage.
| Howard 32, Atholton 28 | ||||||||||||||||||
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| 1st Q | ||||||||||||||||||
| HOW-Price 1 run (Lee kick) | ||||||||||||||||||
| 2nd Q | ||||||||||||||||||
| A-D’Amico 3 pass from McMahon (Haas kick) | ||||||||||||||||||
| A-Ellison 10 pass from McMahon (Haas kick) | ||||||||||||||||||
| 3rd Q | ||||||||||||||||||
| A-King 64 run (Haas kick) | ||||||||||||||||||
| HOW-Bonavitacola 6 run (kick failed) | ||||||||||||||||||
| HOW-Caruso 16 pass from Wade (kick failed) | ||||||||||||||||||
| A-King 69 run (Haas kick) | ||||||||||||||||||
| 4th Q | ||||||||||||||||||
| HOW-Bonavitacola 1 run (kick failed) | ||||||||||||||||||
| HOW-Curley 1 run (Lee kick) |
