It was obvious on Albemarle quarterback DaQuandre Taylor’s face. As his head coach Brandon Isaiah explained in front of the team how hard he is on Taylor and how proud he was of the way he stepped up when the Patriots needed him the most, it was clear, as he fought back tears, what a critical 12-7 victory over Mountain View in his first start meant to the junior and just how hard he’d competed to give the Patriots’ their first 1-0 start since 2006.
“It was a big moment, to do what we did tonight was amazing,” Taylor said. “Words can’t even explain it.”
Taylor clinched the game with a tremendous drive in the closing minutes that melted more than six minutes of clock, allowing the Patriots to capitalize on a flat out dominant defensive effort from a unit that has a lot of new faces but a secondary that couldn’t stop picking off passes against the Wildcats. Kris Anderson setup the drive with the fourth and final interception by the Patriots with 6:30 left in the game. Taylor went to work, hitting KaySean Allen for a 28 yard pickup on third and seven, slipping past a rusher and rolling right to find Allen. Then he ripped off an 18 yard run to continue burning the clock while keeping the chains moving, doing a pretty solid impression of the guy he was replacing, J’Quan Anderson, forced to sit out after an ejection in the Patriots’ playoff loss last season.
“They’re big shoes to fill and I just had to go out and play hard for my team,” Taylor said.
It wasn’t a statistically eye-popping performance with 99 passing yards and 74 on the ground, but Taylor looked the part of the player the Patriots want him to be at quarterback, which will allow them to shift Anderson around to different spots. He was knocked out of the mix with an injury midway through last season. Brock Shorten chipped in with 45 yards on 16 touches as the Patriots looked to grind it out and hold onto the ball from the opening kick. The strategy worked as Mountain View only had three offensive plays in the first quarter.
It was the defense that carried the day for Albemarle, forcing five turnovers including four interceptions by four different players. Na’il Arnold’s pick six with 1:24 left in the first half held up as the game-winner as it put the Patriots up 12-0. Arnold’s big play came shortly after Taylor hit Josh Beidler for a two-yard touchdown and a 6-0 lead, another score setup by an interception, that time snagged by Eric Taylor.
“It caught me by surprise, when Jason (Carson) got a pick, and Kris and (Taylor) and Marquan was hitting today and we just fed off each other,” Arnold said. “It was a good sight to see.”
Mountain View raced back down the field to cut into the lead with 15 seconds left in the half on a short touchdown catch by Brendan Heatherman. But that was the Wildcats lone scoring drive of the night as turnovers plagued Mountain View throughout the second half, including a early one where they coughed the ball up just one play after Jashaad Santiago-Boatwright raced inside the 10 on a kickoff return before getting tripped up by Marquan Jones at the last second in a gutsy effort to run Santiago-Boatwright down.
Jones was a tone-setter from the first defensive play for the Patriots, stepping up and delivering a physical blow at the point of attack to cut short a run. Albemarle seemed to feed off his physicality and he matched it with that hustle play to prevent Mountain View from surging ahead.
“Marquan is a physical player, he loves the confrontation on the field and the guys know it,” said Albemarle coach Brandon Isaiah. “He gives us our identity, he’s a leader and a tough kid.”
The rest of the defense followed Jones’ lead and just made play after play, with Jason Carson posting an interception to round out the Pats’ four-pack along with Arnold, Eric Taylor and Anderson. Caleb Turner came up with the fumble recovery after Jones stopped Santiago-Boatwright.
It was a sterling performance for a defense that has some obvious question marks after the graduation of Zykal Foster and Teshawn Massie, two of the area’s best front seven defenders. But the Patriots answered the ball Friday and with an assist from their quarterback at the end, carried Albemarle to a win.
“It was amazing, I knew what they did last week (in a scrimmage against Riverbend) wasn’t going to happen this week,” DaQuandre Taylor said. “I knew we were going to get in practice and work hard. Without defense we wouldn’t have won this game tonight.”
Albemarle travels for another big test next week against Colonial Forge at 7 p.m.
