High school football: Atlantic's big plays beat Dwyer for district title

PALM BEACH GARDENS — Atlantic clinched the 3M-District 9 title on Friday night, drawing even on record with the Dwyer Panthers following their 32-14 victory.

The Eagles (5-3) and Panthers (5-3) traded blows in the first half, but it was Atlantic that demonstrated a propensity for the big play down the stretch, jump-started by Tyson Lubin’s touchdown and Jayden Parrish’s big play down the near sideline in the second quarter.

Armed with the more physical line on Friday, the Eagles pounded the rock — and when they needed it, quarterback Lincoln Graf was nothing short of deadly on the long ball.

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Here are three takeaways from Atlantic’s big district win.

Big plays highlight dominant night for Atlantic

When it came to the big play, Lubin’’s touchdown and Parrish’s long ball were just the beginning for Atlantic.

Kamare Williams was all over the field on Friday, wreaking havoc throughout the Dwyer secondary.

“I just came out here and did what I had to do, and I put it on the field,” Williams said. “We don’t like to lose.”

And when the halftime rain settled in, drawing a grittier style of ground-pound football, the Eagles used that to their advantage, too.

Atlantic forced three turnovers in the game, including a fumble recovery for a touchdown by Mi’Kel Hendrix that helped break the game wide open in the third quarter, and which teammate Tavius Horne Jr. called a momentum shift in the contest.

"[Shyeia Deveaux] wanted to get it away, but he wanted to run it, too,” Hendrix said. “He couldn’t make up his mind. As soon as he dropped it, I knew I had one. I picked it up, and Coach likes to call it, ‘butt and elbows,’ hit and then go — don’t turn around.”

Dwyer aims for more consistency ahead of playoffs

It’s been a wild season thus far in Palm Beach County. We live in a world where Pahokee beats Central, then loses to Dwyer, which subsequently falls to Atlantic.

But it’s Dwyer picking up the pieces following Friday’s rough loss to Atlantic.

“I made the guys stay out afterwards and see Atlantic celebrate on their field, to let them see that they just won the district championship, that we let it slip out of our hands,” Dwyer head coach Al Shipman said. “I wanted them to have a sour taste in our mouths.”

It was a contest in which the Panthers appeared overmatched in physicality on both sides of the ball, possibly a result of the team prioritizing getting healthy over grinding through the bye week.

That said, there were a number of things that Dwyer would like to have back from Friday’s loss, and first and foremost was the amount of yellow laundry on the field — including back-to-back false starts on a PAT.

“You don’t have to blow everybody out,” Shipman said. “We’ve just got to be more consistent. We’ve got to cut down on our penalties. Right off the top of my head, I’m thinking we had about 10 penalties. You’re not going to be able to win big games and beat good teams with that.

After Friday, the best Dwyer can finish is runner-up in the district — but at 5-3, playoffs are still very much in play.

“You want to win the district and you want to get into the playoffs,” Shipman said. “Obviously, we’re not going to do that, but if we can get into the playoffs and try to make a little run, then it’s a successful season for us.”

Eagles’ players, coaches excited about reaching potential late in season

Every time an Atlantic player spoke up after the game, it was to reaffirm that this version of the Eagles — the version that has gone 4-1 in the last five games — is the one that’s here to stay.

“They kept fighting,” Atlantic head coach Jamael Stewart said. “They kept coming to work. We have a young team, but these kids are learning the game and they're understanding that we’ve got to eliminate the mistakes, and we’re our biggest competition.”

A big problem, Stewart says, was the Eagles’ inability to finish games, an issue that came to a head in their game against Gardens.

In that contest, Atlantic led 36-15 with five minutes left — only to get complacent and allow the Gators to come back and win.

This game was different. This time, they finished.

“The way we’ve played some games during the season, at times, we didn’t play to our full potential, and this game shows what we're capable of, what we can do going forward,” Graf said.

That’s a statement that was echoed by Hendrix, who says that the struggles in the first half of the season are a thing of the past.

“Truth be told, we beat us,” Hendrix said. “Nobody in Palm Beach County has ever beaten us. We beat ourselves. If we come out here every game and play the way we played tonight, we’d be undefeated. And that’s how it should have been from the start.”

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: High school football Atlantic beats Dwyer for 8A-District 9 title