Class 4A Championship Preview

Ian Guerin December 1, 2020 @ 01:56 PM

When your defense is this good, it often gives your offense plenty of time to do the same. Multiply that by two. When A.C. Flora and North Myrtle Beach square off on Saturday for the Class 4A title, the Falcons and Chiefs will do so with the knowledge that their defenses have led the way. Few teams have been able to muster much of anything against these two units, and these players are a big reason why. ON THE FALCONS When A.C. Flora started beating everyone pretty badly early in the year, it snowballed for future opponents. They knew they had to keep their own offenses as balanced as humanly possible so the Falcons wouldn’t close in too quickly. It rarely worked, and head coach Dustin Curtis knew why. “It’s very hard to have a good defensive line,” Curtis said. “To have one good defensive lineman is common. To have a great one top-to-bottom is uncommon.” Curtis’ line, though, is a bit of a misnomer. He likes to shift up linebackers to play a stand-up position in run-support roles and that’s where Max Childress comes in. The 6-foot-1, 200-pounder outside linebacker has five sacks, but his better quality is that of containment. Running backs rarely beat him to the edge. Now add in 280-pound, run-stuffing tackle Jaylin Brown in the middle of the line and things get even more dicey. That inside-outside dilemma is one that no one has been able to master yet, and it’s why the Falcons have one of the best defenses in the state. ON THE CHIEFS North Myrtle Beach coach Matt Reel is an offensive coach by nature. But he was wise enough to see the writing on the wall entering this year. “We had nine starters coming back. I told a lot of people that our defense is going to carry us,” Reel said. “When we lined up in the summer, we could line up without having talking to our kids all summer, and they could recall [play calls] 80-90 percent.” With the likes of Chandler McCall and [player_tooltip player_id="59341" first="Chase" last="Simmons"], Billy Barlow and T.J. Cox already in tow, most of the defense was already locked down before the team took a single snap this year. But what about those two newcomers? Those are defensive tackle Mark Bellamy and defensive end Henry Duke. Despite missing one game, Bellamy has 14 total tackles, 4.5 tackles for loss, three sacks and a fumble recovery. The 6-foot-6 Duke has 23.5 tackles, six tackles for loss, three sacks, a quarterback hurry, a pass break-up and a fumble recovery. Once we got those two spots filled and they got the feel for each other,” Reel said, “it’s taken off from there.” PREP RED ZONE’S PICK These teams look extremely similar on paper, and it’s why so many casual observers will be paying attention when they wrap up the state’s football season late Saturday evening. When the game is over, we give North Myrtle Beach a slight nod for walking away with its first state football title.