Bandys High senior running back Ethan Howard, who set school records for single-season and career rushing this season, has been named the South Fork 2A’s Offensive Player of the Year./MICHELLE THOMPSON PHOTO
HobbsDailyReport.com
A 44-player All-South Fork 2A team for football this season is led by a record-setting senior running back from Bandys High and a sophomore defensive end from North Lincoln.
In voting by league head coaches released by Butch Parker, the conference’s executive secretary, the Offensive Player of the Year award went to Bandys’ Ethan Howard.
The Defensive Player of the Year is North Lincoln’s Travali Price, while Maiden’s Dylan Abernethy won Specialist of the Year.
BAZZLE
The Coach of the Year award was won by Nick Bazzle, who guided North Lincoln (10-4) to a second place finish in his first season as the Knights’ head coach.
Howard (5-foot-11, 245 pounds) was the conference’s most dominant and leading rusher as he helped Bandys go 7-0 to win a South Fork 2A title and finish 12-2 overall in Tom Eanes’ first season as head coach at Bandys.
The Trojans reached the third round of the state 2AA playoffs – falling 34-15 last Friday night at Hibriten – as Howard and eight other all-league players, a league high, led the way.
Howard finished with 306 carries for 2,398 yards rushing this season, averaging 7.8 yards per carry, and he scored 26 rushing TDs. He rushed for 171.4 yards per game en route to setting Bandys records for single-season yardage and a school record for career rushing (656-4,633, 45 rushing TDs).
Howard ran for more than 100 yards in 12 games this season, highlighted by 205 yards in a title-deciding victory at North Lincoln plus 633 yards in three postseason games – 220 against Franklin, 224 against West Stokes and 189 against Hibriten.
Price (6-4, 220) led North Lincoln’s defense with 38 solo tackles, 80 assists and 118 tackles with 23 of them for lost yardage. He added 15 ½ sacks, recovered two fumbles and forced three fumbles on a defense that allowed 20.6 points per game.
Abernethy, a 6-0, 160-pound junior, had 200 punt return yards, 122 kickoff return yards and caught 43 passes for 951 yards and 13 TDs.
Bazzle returned to coaching at North Lincoln after taking two years off after leaving Alexander Central. He was head coach prior to that at Newton-Conover.
A Lincoln County native who was a football star at East Lincoln High and then played at Guilford College, Bazzle’s first team at North Lincoln matched the school record for wins (10) set in 2007.
The Knights snapped a streak of nine straight losing seasons that included going 4-18 over a two-year stretch and 23-76 since their last winning record (7-5) in 2008.
Bazzle’s teams are 139-89 in his 19 years as a head coach.
ALL-SOUTH FORK 2A FOOTBALL
(as voted on by conference head coaches)
Bandys (9): Ethan Howard, Nash Shook, Aaron Johnson, Jacob Ellis, Lake Hojnacki, Josh Williams, Nate Mirman, Jared Maynard, Elijah Clarke
East Lincoln (5): Chazz Williams, Jud Reel, Ethan Martin, Spencer Sinyard, Sidney Dollar
Lake Norman Charter (2): Davis Wilder, Jaden Goodman
Lincolnton (3): Caden Wyatt, Dajzay Powell, Zackary Smith
Maiden (6): Caleb McDaniel, Dylan Abernethy, Gannon Bishop, Chris Morgan, Lee Turner, Montrell Stinson
Newton-Conover (4): Kyjuan McClain, Jaden Adair, Qualen Noell, Jaylon Corpening
North Lincoln (8): Clayton Cribb, Jake Soorus, Sam Brady, Joseph Elberti, Daniel Carter, Travali Price, Landon Beard, Jacob Harmon
West Lincoln (7): Dylan Beam, Canon Bridges, Jessie Hatcher, Brendon Ikard, Nakathon Phansook, Broderick Steele, Seth Willis
Comments 1
Congrats to all of the players ,its a shame Ethan Howard and the rb from Hibriten didn’t make the Shrine bowl .Coach Eanes did a tremendous Job at Bandys and deserved Coach of the year too.