Providence Grove one win away from first-ever solo conference championship

TRINITY — When the lights are turned on to illuminate the football field at Providence Grove High School Friday night, the lights will be shining on more than just a normal high school football game. The lights will be shining over a PG team attempting to win its first out-right conference championship in school history.

Battling through adversity — namely a stretch that has seen the program have four head coaches in a four-year period — the Patriots will host Thomasville with a win securing an outright Central Carolina Conference title. A loss would leave the Patriots tied with Thomasville for the league crown with West Davidson also earning a share should it win its game Friday night at East Davidson.

Either way, the Patriots have earned a share of the title with last Friday night’s 48-38 win over Wheatmore with one more win securing that title outright.

“We already have a share of it, but we don’t want to share it with anyone,” said first-year head coach Cody Moran after the Patriots set themselves up for the regular-season finale with the win over Wheatmore. “Just to be able to tell these guys — four coaches in four years. It’s been a mentality shift. We’ve always been okay with being average and we’re tired of being average.”

The Patriots are far from average. The win over Wheatmore raised their record to 7-2 on the season, one win shy of tying the all-time school mark for wins in a season. It’s already been a big turnaround from a season ago when the Pats finished 3-7 and missed the playoffs.

“It means everything,” said senior quarterback Jackson Lawver, who threw for 182 yards and two scores while rushing for 116 yards and three touchdowns against the Warriors. “We’ve had four coaches in four years. If you would have told me last year we’d be in this situation, I definitely wouldn’t have believed you. I love the guys, love the team. We’re all really excited for next week.”

The players and coaches agree a culture shift was needed after last year and Moran and his young coaching staff provided that.

“It’s more of a family,” Lawver said. “We stay up, positive. In years before, we would be down on ourselves. We would have never had been able to come back. Our coaches stay up, keep us encouraged. The culture is completely different. The coaches support us and they actually listen to us. It’s all in the coaches.”

Moran said the reverse has been true as well.

“Another thing that has changed is the coaches are taking responsibility,” Moran said. “It’s not all on the guys. We’re a young staff. We told them straight up there are going to be times we mess up and you have to bail us out and there will be times you mess up and we’ll do our best to bail you out as well.”

Though the Warriors were 1-7 heading into the game with PG, it was quite a battle with the Patriots jumping out to a 10-0 lead after the first quarter before PG was able to answer every WHS score the rest of the way.

PG led 20-14 at halftime, 27-14 in the third quarter before WHS made it 27-20 to end the third quarter. PG took a two-score lead at 34-20 early in the final period, but WHS closed to within 34-28 with 8:25 to play before two late PG scores salted it away.

Lawver was 13 of 21 for 182 yards and two scores in the passing department, while rushing 15 times for 116 yards and three more scores.

Andrew Thomas had one rushing and one receiving score, while kicker Carson Jones nailed field goals of 41 and 47 yards and was 6-for-6 on PATs. Connor Tozer also caught a TD pass. Holden Swift led the defense with three interceptions.

Wheatmore’s Connor Benton threw for 273 yards and four scores, with three of those going to Bentley Mills. Mills finished with seven receptions for 165 yards.

Now PG’s thoughts center completely on Thomasville.

“It’s special,” Thomas said of this week’s battle with the Bulldogs. “Obviously, no one has ever done it. Being the first team to do that is really special. Everyone is believing we can do it and going the same way. Coaches believe and we believe. It’s all coming together.”

It very well could be coming together with an outright conference championship on the line.