Preps

Northeast 30, Osceola 14

By MIKE COLAPIETRO, Times Correspondent
Published November 3, 2007

ST. PETERSBURG - Northeast coach Jay Austin and the Vikings will host a three-team tiebreaker at 7 p.m. Monday after Northeast, Lakewood and Bradenton Southeast all finished District 4A-9 play with identical 3-2 records. Lakewood will play Southeast in the first quarter, with the Vikings playing the winner to determine the district runnerup. Boca Ciega wrapped up the district championship win a victory Friday night.

Needing the win to stay in the postseason hunt, Northeast got things rolling early, with Armando Sanchez throwing touchdown passes of 53 and 14 yards on the Vikings' first two offensive plays of the game.

Osceola started to creep its way back into the game when defensive end Reece Dantzscher recovered a Darryl Copeland fumble at the 39-yard line, setting up Matt Palmer's 25-yard field goal. Palmer scored 12 of Osceola's 14 points and gained 129 yards on the ground.

Northeast quickly countered, scoring on Tim Tisdale's 25-yard scoring run. And Osceola, behind a 34-yard run by Palmer, set up another 25-yard field goal.

But the Vikings answered with another touchdown by Tisdale with just over a minute to play.

The Warriors refused to be put away as Palmer returned the ensuing kickoff 95 yards for a touchdown.

"We get up by a bunch of points, and we can't handle the lead, haven't been able to all season," Austin said. "It's something we need to work on."

The half ended on a 26-yard field goal by Viking kicker Lukaz Chrzastek that would prove to be the last points of the game.

"I'm proud of them, we have our victory," Austin said. "We will not have any post season success playing like that though."

[Last modified November 3, 2007, 00:23:30]