Cambridge scored on all six first-half possessions and broke the game open with four second-quarter touchdown passes by Zach Harris to beat host Pope 59-21 in a Region 7-AAAAAA game Friday in Marietta.
Harris threw a 1-yard touchdown pass to T.J. Mowery on the first play of the second quarter to give the Bears a 17-0 lead. He threw an 84-yard scoring pass to Evan Kurtz on the Bears’ next possession, then connected twice with Hayden Gardella (55 and 9 yards) to give Cambridge a 38-7 lead at halftime.
Harris was 14-for-16 for 274 yards in the first half. He finished with 316 yards and added a 3-yard touchdown run in the third quarter that gave the Bears a 52-7 lead.
Phillip Michael Collins ran for 129 yards and two touchdowns on 20 carries and had six receptions for 64 yards. Eight players had at least one reception for Cambridge, which finished with 524 yards of total offense. The Bears’ 59 points were the second most in the program’s eight-year history.
“You know, we were seven points away from being 6-1 after the first couple of region games, but we’re just young,” Cambridge coach Craig Bennett said. “We’ve got one senior on offense and two that start on defense. So it was just a process of getting these guys to believe in what we do, and it showed tonight. It finally did. We put a complete game together.”
Cambridge (4-5, 3-4), in seventh place in the nine-team region and its playoff hopes fading fast after a two-game losing streak, needed a big game to retain any chance of reaching the postseason for the first time since 2016. The Bears got it, but they’ll still need to beat Alpharetta, undefeated in region play, in the regular-season finale and get a lot of help elsewhere in the region.
Pope (5-4, 4-3) is still in position to clinch third place in the region with a victory at Northview next week, but a loss potentially could keep the Greyhounds out of the playoffs.
On the game’s first play from scrimmage, Cambridge’s Morgan Leemaster recovered a Pope fumble at the Greyhounds’ 22-yard line. Pope held the Bears to a field goal - a 30-yarder by Will Petit with 9:47 to play in the first quarter. Collins scored on a 1-yard run on Cambridge’s next possession for a 10-0 lead with 4:13 to play in the first quarter.
Harris took over from there and put the game away early.
Pope quarterback Kemper Hodges was 9-of-18 passing for 120 yards. Will Zegers had 38 yards on six carries to lead the running game.
“They’re resilient and they’re a bunch of tough kids,” Bennett said of his team. “That’s what we talk about being. We’re not very flashy, or we don’t think we are. We pride ourselves on being tough, playing physical football. [Pope] is a physical football team. Credit to coach [Tab] Griffin. They’ve done a good job of developing that offense to be physical. We had to match it.”
Cambridge 10-28-14-7 - 59
Pope 0- 7- 7-7 - 21
First quarter
C - Will Petit 30 field goal, 9:47
C - Phillip Michael Collins 1 run (Petit kick), 4:13
Second quarter
C - T.J. Mowery 1 pass from Zach Harris (Petit kick), 11:54
C - Evan Kurtz 84 pass from Harris (Petit kick), 6:40
P - Ross Trombetti 18 pass from Kemper Hodges (Hudson Standfest kick), 4:15
C - Hayden Gardella 55 pass from Harris (Petit kick), 2:48
C - Gardella 9 pass from Harris (Petit kick), 1:18
Third quarter
C - Collins 33 run (Petit kick), 6:32
C - Harris 3 run (Petit kick), 4:37
P - Trombetti 39 pass from Hodges (Standfest kick), 0:37
Fourth quarter
C - Garrett Cotnoir 20 run (McCall Bennett kick), 6:01
P - Robert Hosack 3 run (Standfest kick), 0:50
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