Lely Scores 90! 

Lely coach Ben Hammer got a surprise when he looked up at the scoreboard during his team’s final practice Wednesday leading up to Friday night’s 90-56 huge road win over Barron Collier.

“Coach Boston actually put last year's score up on the scoreboard for the whole practice,” Hammer said. 

Boston is the nickname for Mark Sanon, an assistant head coach who works with the varsity defensive line. He is also the head coach of the Trojans’ underclassmen. Sanon wanted to remind this year’s Trojans of last season’s 47-29 loss to Barron Collier.

“That fired the kids up pretty good,” Hammer said. "He didn't even tell me he was going to do it. He just did it.”

The Trojans did it Friday night, scoring at will on the Cougars on their Homecoming night, setting several likely school records in the process.

The Trojans started playing football in 1974 but don’t really have an official record book. Consequently, confirming all-time school records is sketchy. 

Several of Friday's likely school records belong to sophomore running back Nino Joseph: 424 yards rushing, seven touchdowns, and a 23-yard-a-carry average. Joseph’s touchdowns were 54, 40, 40, 65, 85, 6, and 5-yarders. Joseph’s five touchdowns of over 40 yards is yet another likely school record.

As far as team goals, scoring 90 points is another likely school record. So are the team's 832 total yards of total offense and 563 rushing yards.

"Super proud of Nino,” Hammer said. "Super proud of all our kids. They played hard, did a great job this evening.”

He may not have set any school records Friday night, but junior quarterback Carter Quinn turned in a fine performance both running and passing the football. Quinn was 14-23 for 269 yards passing with four long touchdown passes. He also passed for six two-point conversions. But his best play may have been a beautifully executed 46-yard quarterback run. Quinn faked to Joseph, who was immediately swarmed by two Barron Collier defenders. Quinn spun away from the defenders and sprinted to the end zone for Lely’s second score. Quinn has 11 touchdown passes and no interceptions through five games.

Hurricane Helene canceled school Thursday and Friday, but most of the local football games were able to be played Friday night.

Barron Collier was far from a no-show on Homecoming night. They went toe-to-toe with the Trojans and actually trailed just 38-28 at halftime. But Lely took over in the second half, outscoring the Cougars 52-28. In fact, Lely was scoring so quickly that their defense seemed to be tiring from being on the field so much.

“We're very young in the defensive backfield,” Hammer said. "They're a young group. We're going to keep progressing there and getting better. They battled. All those guys are sophomores. They're doing the best they can. We put Ty Collins back there to help them out. He's a great athlete and a pretty physical tackler. But he's got to understand the coverages a little more. They're just young. They're going to keep growing up and keep getting better. We've got to do a better job of tackling, and we've got to do a better job of not letting them in the end zone and getting first downs. We've got to set edges. It's all stuff that that we can do better. I'm proud of our defense. We've got to continue to get better. Our defensive line is coming along pretty well. The defense got stops when they needed to.”

Despite giving up a number of big plays, the Trojans' defense ended up stopping Barron Collier seven times on third down.

The Trojans got a key piece back this when senior utility man Gage Rice returned from a hip injury. Having Rice back gives the Trojans more options.

"Having Gage back is an incredible safety net to have,” Hammer said. “It frees us up to do more with Ty. It frees us up to do more with Zephaniah Diamond as well.”

Diamond, a junior receiver, responded with two long touchdown catches of 46 and 53 yards. 

The win over Barron Collier (1-4) is a district win, which is a big plus for the Trojans' playoff hopes. Their remaining district games are against Aubrey Rogers (3-2) on October 10 and Bonita Springs (1-5) on October 25. But like all coaches, Hammer takes them one game at a time. On Friday, the Trojans (3-2) travel to Immokalee (5-1) for a 7:30 start. The Indians are coming off a 44-12 win over Golden Gate, who Lely defeated 66-36 in Week Two.