November 19, 2022
Lake & Sumter County High School Football Playoff Results 11.18.2022
By Kyle Coppola
Lake & Sumter County High School Football Playoff Results 11.18.2022
Which Lake & Sumter County Football Teams Made The Regional Finals?
An epic night of High School Football action has ended with two teams in Lake & Sumter County headed for a chance to make the State Semi Finals! Find out how South Sumter, Lake Minneola and Wildwood did and who is left standing!
It wasn’t easy for the Hawks early on but they pulled off the victory to head to the Regional Finals! The Hawks were up 21-7 at the end of the 1st quarter. Quarterback Quinn Neimann looked impressive along with running back John Celestin who has looked good all season long. Junior WR Braylon Knauth also picked apart the defense of Winter Haven early on.
The Blue Devils made things interesting in the second quarter when quarterback #12 Joseph Tarver with scored a 10 Yd Rushing TD. That brought Winter Haven within a touchdown. Late in the second quarter Winter Havens defense stepped up as #1 Terrel Redding intercepted a Quinn Neumann pass and had the ball on their own 40-yard line. Unfortunately the Blue Devils couldn’t do anything offensively and at the half Winter Haven had a potential upset brewing only down by a touchdown!
Lake Minneola must have had one heck of a halftime pep talk as head coach Walter Banks came out with a team that looked much better in the second half! Although the early part of the third quarter was back and fourth Lake Minneola intercepted a Blue Devil pass late in the third quarter setting up QB Quinn Neimann who threw a touchdown pass to Braylon Knauth and the Hawks went up 28-14!
You could tell that touchdown literally took the wind out of the sails of The Billie Devils. They never looked the same after that. The Hawks continued to pound the ball and scored 3 more touchdowns putting the game well out of reach! The Blue Devils fought valiantly but ultimately The Hawks were the better team!
Lake Minneola heads to the Regional Finals where they will have to travel to take on Lakeland who defeated Mitchell tonight to earn the right to host the Regional Finals. We have the best two teams on their respective sections of the bracket facing one another next Friday night! What a matchup that will be down in Lakeland and we wish The Hawks the best of luck!
South Sumter kept their perfect season alive and improve to 12-0 on the year. They will host the Regional Final at South Sumter with the winner headed to the state semifinals! South Sumter was dominant but was challenged early in this game. Hudson was a decent team this season and came in with a 9-2 record. But South Sumter just dismantled this team as the game went along.
The first half got started off to a hot start with South Sumter QB 5 Eian Finkley tossing a 15 Yd pass completed for a TD. That made it 7-0 Raiders. Hudson would then actually score a touchdown of their own after running back #81 Elias Williams ran for a 10 Yd Rushing TD. Hudson would then miss the extra point so the Raiders still led 7-6.
South Sumter would struggle offensively at the start but the defense backed them up when they got a Pick 6! #2 George Mullins ran the ball into the end zone for a 30-yard return. The score was then 14-6. Hudson looked rattled at this point but they weren’t out of it yet because Hudson kick returner #14 James Conley ran back an 80 Yd Punt Return for a TD! Hudson added a 2 point conversion and the game was tied!
Unfortunately for Hudson that’s the last points they would score all night. South Sumter added another touchdown early in the second quarter when running back #6 Jawarren Corbin took the ball in for a 10 Yd Rushing TD. Eian Finkley added another rushing touchdown to make it 28-14 and then South Sumter really started to pile it on.
Middle Linebacker
Hudson couldn’t get the offense going and the defense of South Sumter came up with some great defensive stands to force Hudson to punt the ball numerous occasions. Another amazing play by Raider quarterback Eian Finkley added yet another touchdown when he threw for a 40 Yd pass completed to #33 Colby Rinberger for a TD. That made it 35-14. Eian Finkley and Jamare Dorsey each ran for yet another touchdown in the 2nd half and Hudson could do nothing but watch as the time wound down.
South Sumter grabbed the victory 49-14 to propel them into the Regional finals where they will host Cocoa! Those are the number 1 and number 2 teams In the bracket so if South Sumter plans on playing in December they better go easy on Thanksgiving dinner the night before because Cocoa will be their hardest challenge yet!
What a great win for The Raiders! We are so happy for the team and we wish them the best of luck as they host the Regional Final!
In perhaps the best game of the season these two teams have proved year after year why this game is one of the best of the season! It came down to the wire but Hawthorne ultimately prevailed and eliminated Wildwood from the playoffs for the 4th year in a row.
The game started off with a Wildwood 3 and out. They punted the ball to Hawthorne. Immediately following Wildwood intercepted the ball and ran it in for a touchdown to take the early lead 7-0. Hawthorne would settle in after that putting together a monster 70 yard drive as they came down and scored the equalizing touchdown which made it 7-6. Hawthorne would go for a two point conversion that failed so Wildwood maintained the lead.
Early in the 2nd quarter Wildwood would score another touchdown and extend their lead 13-6 and they also ran in for a two point conversion attempt which made it 15-6. It looked like Wildwood might be cruising to a massive upset but Hawthorne had other plans.
Early in the 3rd quarter Hawthorne stormed down the field to score their second touchdown of the game. That made it 15-13. Meanwhile The Wildcats offense couldn’t get going in the third quarter and punted the ball to Hawthorne who again stormed down the field and took the lead for the first time late in the third quarter.
At the start of the 4th Quarter Wildwood knew the season was on the line. They had to get the ball in the end zone and find some form of offense. Vernell Brown III and Vincent Brown Jr. played their hearts out up until this point. Even though the third quarter did not go how they envisioned you could see the fire in their eyes.
However the defense of Hawthorne was just too much for the Wildcats to overcome. A few turnover on downs and punts lead to Hawthorne running back #7 Cj Ingram rushing touchdown which made it 27-15 early in the 4th quarter! Hawthorne would add one more rushing touchdown late in the 4th quarter and that’s all she wrote.
It was a stellar season for Wildwood. They had so much success and brought so much pride to the city of Wildwood as they do every year. This is a tough one to take as this is the 4th straight year Hawthorne has eliminated Wildwood from the playoffs! That is a hard statistic to even comprehend and I feel for all the seniors who never got to beat Hawthorne but it shows what a program they have and they deserve to be in the Regional Finals.
For Wildwood we thank this team for all the memories this year and we look forward to seeing another strong effort from this team as they return in 2023!
We had 2 out of 3 Lake & Sumter County teams move on to the Regional High School Football Finals! While we are saddened at the end of Wildwood’s football season we are excited for Lake Minneola and South Sumter to represent our counties in the state finals! They will of course have to beat some difficult teams. We will have a full breakdown of each game on Thursday of next week! We wish both The Raiders and Hawks the best of luck as they prepare for the most intense weekend of football they will play all year! If you are in the area next Friday, South Sumter hosts the Regional Final in Bushnell. We would love to see everyone come out and support The Raiders as they play host to Cocoa! What an exciting game that will be!
Photography provided by
Wildwood High School
Vernell Brown Jr,
Steed Multimedia
Joe Lett Photography
Lake Minneola Facebook
South Sumter Athletics Facebook
Kyle Coppola was born in Newton, Massachusetts and received his Bachelor of Fine Arts in Communications from Curry College in 2016. After traveling to Florida on a family vacation, he decided he could not get enough of the warm weather and made the move from snowy Massachusetts to central Florida 8 years ago.
For the last decade Kyle has gained valuable experience in social media content creation, marketing and sales, writing, video production, sports announcing and even broadcasting for local radio stations, such as FM 102.9 in The Villages and FM 91.5 in Massachusetts. Every year he volunteers at The Villages Charter High School as a play-by-play sports announcer for the football games as well as a public address announcer for the basketball games, including the annual Battle at The Villages Tournament.
Outside the office Kyle is a husband and father to two beautiful girls along with their cat. In his spare time he likes to spend time with his family, travel, play golf and swim. He is also a huge sports junkie and even bigger motorsports fan and loves to attend racing events when he can.
