It wasn’t as if the varsity football team from Linganore High School in Frederick, Maryland, thought Saturday’s home opener would be easy. They knew full well that the star player from Edgewood, Deonte Banks, was a heavily recruited Division 1 prospect, headed to the University of Maryland on a full-ride football scholarship next year.
I am 100% Committed To The University Of Maryland 💯 #FEARTHETURTLE🐢😤 @CoachDurkin pic.twitter.com/wYbmHJyvDK
— Deonte Banks 🦍✨ (@IamDeonteBanks_) June 23, 2018
Banks put an 86-yard touchdown run on the board to bring his team within 1 point early in the game. But all that kind of thing does for a good defense is wake them up. And Linganore’s defense is arguably the best in the county.
“It raises up my level of play because you know you have to go out there and compete,” the Frederick News-Post quoted the Lancers’ do-it-all athlete Joey Felton as saying after the Lancers beat the Rams, 54-18. “When another player is playing at that high of a level, you have to retaliate and try to get as many points on the scoreboard as you possibly can.”
Felton caught seven passes for 161 yards, including a touchdown, and on defense, ran an interception back 60 yards for another TD.
The Linganore offense did the rest.
“The offense can’t really be stopped,” sports editor Jason Byrd quoted running back Davon Butler as saying in The Lance student newspaper at Linganore. “All of our running backs are strong, and the line is incredible. We just have to create a productive drive every time.”
Linganore coach Rick Simmons had great praise for his opponent, calling them “a really talented team. They’ve got a lot of things that football coaches like.”
But with Linganore’s defense mixing it up and giving the offense a short field on so many drives, the Lancers just couldn’t be beat, even with Banks’s talent on the other side of the ball.
The game was scheduled to be played Friday night at Linganore, but as with so many games in many locations across the country this weekend, inclement weather caused a rescheduling.
