On Location: Kinley Jr., Gray shine as Lausanne defeats Whitehaven 26-23
MEMPHIS | The scheduled kickoff time for Friday's matchup between Lausanne Collegiate and the Tigers of Whitehaven was changed multiple time before the 7pm kickoff. At one point, the game was set to be played on Thursday night. The decision was made about two weeks ago to push it to Friday night.
The game lived up to the hype.
Whitehaven scored first on a Keveon Mullins TD catch, which was followed up by a TD catch and run by Lausanne ATH Jaylon Johnson on a screen pass.
The two Bluff City heavyweights would go back and forth the entire game on the field at Rhodes College.
Late in the 4th quarter, as Lausanne was driving with under a minute on the clock, Eric Gray fumbled in the red zone, leading to overtime.
Whitehaven was forced to kick a FG after Mullins dropped a TD pass on a jump-ball in the endzone.
"Write an article about that!" Lausanne OL/DL Gary Walton screamed after Gray scored the game-winning touchdown, which can be seen below.
My four main takeaways from Friday's game can also be seen below.
Lausanne ain't scared Pawl
Lausanne has not been playing football very long, at all. I'll save the history lesson for the historians, but Lausanne and Whitehaven don't HAVE to play each other like this, yet following Friday's game, there is already discussion about continuing the series.
Lausanne has won two consecutive games in the series, and now has 30 consecutive wins. They dressed 38 players. That's almost unheard of.
Maybe private and public schools in Tennessee shouldn't be separated after-all?
Regardless, Lausanne won't back down from anybody, and that mindset starts at the top with head coach Kevin Locastro.
Landing Eric Gray needs to be priority No. 1 for Ole Miss
I could videos of each Eric Gray carry, and let those speak for themselves. I could post his stat line and let that speak for itself. That wouldn't be doing Gray justice, who does the little things just as passionately as he does the big things.
Blitz pickup? Yep. Blocking for the QB on the option? Yep. Special Teams? Yep.
The three-star (?) RB remains currently committed to Michigan, but it is no secret that SEVERAL programs from around the southeast are turning up the heat.
His next two visits? Ole Miss and Tennessee.
Bryson Eason was missed, but Martavius French stepped up
Note: 2020 Whitehaven four-star LB Bryson Eason remained out on Friday night with injuries to both his ankle as well as his achilles.
Eason and French are best friends, and will likely play at the same school when the time comes for the class of 2020 duo. French was thrust into the lead role in arguably the team's biggest game of the season on Friday night.
French, time and time again, made the plays when needed, including the forced fumble deep in Whitehaven territory near the end of regulation
The team came up short in the end, but that loss isn't on the defense.
Richard Kinley Jr. is a Power 5 LB/DE
As you can see by the rating above, not much is expected of Richard Kinley Jr. at the next level. Kinley lets that rating, and his current offer sheet motivate him everyday.
"It fuels my fire everyday," Kinley said about the rating. On Friday night, he had five sacks.
He'll visit Georgia Tech for their next home game Sept. 22nd against Clemson.