In Their Own Words - Voices of the PAC-6 - Lee County vs. Northern Durham (11/18/2010)

PHOTO BY C.F. WARD

How quickly a season can end and in some cases the suddenness of it isn't helped a bit in that moment by what one has accomplished to get to that point.  But for the Knights of Northern Durham, the path that they traveled over the past two years to eventually fall in the first round of the playoffs to Lee County, 16-12 [DFBFan's Pick - Northern Durham 22, Lee County 13], should be something incredibly sturdy to take solace in and build for the future.  After pushing through a win less 2009 season under the leadership of head coach Anthony Sullivan things began to click this season in small ways even with losses early this season to powerhouses like Wake Forest-Rolesville.  Although the W's weren't appearing in the newspaper, a higher level of competition was and that was seen in full glory during the conference race this season where the Knights catapulted to a third place finish and played for a share of the conference title in their final regular season game of the year.  No doubt that the Knights had made some hefty strides from a year earlier and playing a home playoff game was simply another step in the right direction.

The Yellow Jackets came into the contest on a multiple game losing streak after putting together a solid opening to the season.  But when you looked over the teams that Lee County had fallen to over the final month of the season it became clear that simply looking at the final scores was probably not completely indicative of what they were made of, as they had fallen to some of the top teams in the area, including two that moved on to the second round of the playoffs and a third that was knocked out by one of those two in a razor-sharp affair (Cary).  For the Knights, they had also stumbled on tough times, losing to Southern Durham and Hillside in their final two games, but as with Lee's opponents, both of these teams notched first round victories to move onto the second round as well.

Statistically, both teams were evenly matched and in our breakdown of the game we indicated that the game would most likely come down to the wire and the team that could make the final plays and had the most confidence after their recent slides would probably get the win [PAC-6 Breakdown (Week 1 Playoffs) - Yellow Jackets visit Knights - County versus County!].  Northern's solid rush attack showed up and moved the ball, while Lee County's passing attack came back to life and got the edge on a better than average Knight pass defense.  With less than five seconds in the game and four points separating the teams, the Knights threw up their final chance and although the pass dropped to the turf and the Yellow Jackets moved forward to the second round you have to believe that the Knights have also moved forward in a positive way.  This is a team with youth, that now has experience and some confidence and is fortunate to be led by a coaching staff that wants nothing more than to be competing for PAC-6 titles year-in-and-year-out.

There is a lot of reason to believe that this off-season will be one of the more high octane based programs in the area, which can only mean that the PAC-6 will be that much more competitive in 2011.  The following quotes are from the voices of the PAC-6 and were included in an article from the Herald-Sun.  For more information on the game, follow the links provided at the end of the post.

Northern Durham head coach Anthony Sullivan addressed the media after the game and explained the effort put forth by his Knights and what he thought was the difference in a hard-fought loss.

"We fought hard for four quarters of football and just came up short," Sullivan said. "We had too many penalties and lost the turnover battle, which both really hurt us tonight."

Coach Sullivan went on to speak about his team and trying to put in perspective the path they have taken together over the past two years.

"I told them they should be proud of themselves," Sullivan said. "We've come a long way and overcome adversity since last year. To go 0-11 and then have a chance to win a first-round game shows a lot about this team's character."

Durham Herald-Sun (article by Tucker Frazier)
Sanford Herald (article by Jonathan Owens)
News & Observer (staff reports)