Blackman ended their first-round playoff matchup against Lebanon in a familiar way—celebrating yet another win. It was another dominating performance from both the Blackman defensive and offensive units.
Here are three big things from Blackman’s 44-7 victory over Lebanon.
Tamicus Napier’s Big Night
The Blaze controlled Friday night’s game from the first offensive play when senior running back Tamicus Napier busted through a massive hole provided by his offensive line for a 40-yard play.
A handful of plays later, Napier scored the first of many Blackman touchdowns in the Blaze’s 44-7 playoff victory over Lebanon.
“I know how it feels for somebody to break a big play on the first play of the game,” said Napier following the game. “I wanted to let them know that this is what we’re going to do all night. I wanted to set the tone right there.”
Napier’s longest run of the night came with a little over five minutes remaining in the first half when his offensive line again parted the Lebanon defensive front like the Red Sea, opening another huge hole for Napier to take off for 51-yards and his second of three scores on the night.
“They’re great, man,” Napier said of the Blackman offensive line. “I try to thank them after every run. I don’t care [if] it’s five yards, ten yards, or a touchdown.”
Napier finished the night with 255-yards rushing and three touchdowns.
Beam to Elder for Six
Against Riverdale last week, quarterback Drew Beam connected with receiver Micaleous Elder three times for touchdowns. Two of those plays were deep passes of 31 and 66 yards respectively.
Friday night against Lebanon, the pair picked up where they left off with a Beam-bomb from 40-yards to Elder in the end zone with under a minute to play in the first half.
“It’s very easy to throw to an athlete like him,” said the sophomore quarterback. “He’s insane. He’ll do whatever the coaches ask him to. He runs amazing routes and he’s very fast.”
“He’s young so he just practices on his arm power and when he throws it, I can go get it,” said Elder.
With a lot of the offensive focus on guys like Arkansas commits Adonis Otey and Trey Knox, the sophomore quarterback hasn’t had the pressure nor the hype that usually surrounds signal callers.
“It keeps me humble not having all the publicity around me,” said Beam. “We’re a unit. The linemen do good, the receivers are on point all the time. There are studs all around the field.”
Beam followed up last week’s 290-yard, four touchdown performance with 140-yards passing and two touchdowns for the Blaze.
Up Next: Undefeated Mount Juliet
With Mount Juliet’s 42-7 win over Cookeville on Friday night, Blackman will travel to play the 11-0 Golden Bears next week.
The teams have a handful of common opponents this season. The teams also have remarkably similar outcomes in those games. Blackman defeated Hendersonville 28-10 in the season’s first week. Mount Juliet beat the Commandos 28-13. Both teams beat Cookeville by exactly 35-points.
Their only common opponent with drastically different outcomes was Lebanon, whom the Golden Bears defeated by a tally of 14-10 at Lebanon.
Comparative scores never tell the whole tale, but it does seem like this could be a great matchup of evenly matched teams next Friday.
“They tie their shoes up and put their helmet on like we do and it’s time to go to war,” said Elder.
Added Napier, “We’re going into their stadium and their atmosphere, but we’re not going in as underdogs.” He continued, “We’ve got a mindset. We know what we’ve come to do.”
Other Scores from the First Round
Oakland 49, Rossview 10 (Plays Hendersonville next week)
Hendersonville 23, Riverdale 14
Independence 33, Smyrna 14
Riverside 36, Eagleville 35 (OT)
MTCS 54, Jackson Christian 42
