Elrich Bowlay-Williams said his team is pushing through adversity, but he was the one doing all the pushing Friday.
The senior running back rushed for two touchdowns in Longwood’s first win of the season, a 33-6 rout of Central Islip Sept. 14.
“We’re finally putting stuff together,” said Bowlay-Williams, pointing to last year’s 1-6 season. “We’re finally bonding, and we’re going to do big things this year.”
The win not only gives the Lions some confidence following a less-than-perfect 2017 campaign, it helps them bounce back from a 43-14 season-opening loss to William Floyd this past Saturday. Junior wide receiver Zach Soriano said he expected nothing less under the Friday night lights in front of a packed-out home stadium.
“We were pumped,” he said. “Our mentality was ‘just win,’ and nothing else.”
Bowlay-Williams opened and closed the scoring for the game, and the first quarter. He completed a 2-point conversion following sophomore Abeid Thomas’ touchdown run up the middle on a first-and-goal to give the Lions a 14-0 advantage heading into the locker room.
“We wanted to get this win, and it wasn’t the best-looking win, but this was very important for us,” Longwood head coach Jeff Cipp said. “Hopefully we can build on it from here.”
Central Islip did a little pulling instead of pushing. The defense raked in two interceptions on the evening, the second, a pick 6 by Tyli’Que Walker with 11.4 seconds in the third that brought the score to 21-6.
It’s what came after though that really lit up the crowd.
At the buzzer to end the quarter, Soriano carried the ball 69 yards into the end zone. His run wouldn’t have been possible if it wasn’t for senior middle linebacker Kyle Rausch’s big block to set up a clear path down the right sideline.
“Everyone was chasing me,” Soriano said, laughing. “I was just running as fast as I could. I saw Kyle Rausch lay the kid out and just ran straight.”
Longwood finished with three sacks, and Central Islip made two in a row. The teams combined to block three extra-point kick attempts.
“The defense was swarming to the ball, but offensively we have to protect our quarterback better,” Cipp said. “Bowlay-Williams helped off-set that, he was running hard, finding the seam and if get a little daylight he’s gone.”
Soriano saw the importance of the running game, with five of the scoring plays coming on rushes, and had faith the ground team could get the job done.
“We knew we were a team set to win,” Soriano said. “We just had to go out there and run it, and that’s what we did.”
