news-record.com

GREENSBORO — Penalties? They don’t seem to bother Northern Guilford’s offense.

For the second straight week, the Nighthawks, No. 6 in the News & Record top ten, committed several costly penalties on offense, but they also had big plays to overcome those penalties and defeat No. 7 Northeast Guilford 40-14 Friday night.

The Nighthawks finished with 95 yards in penalties after racking up 150 in the first game of the season.

“That (penalties) is something that we’ve worked on,” said Northern coach Johnny Roscoe. “We try not to be over-aggressive. But we executed on offense. Mohamed (Khellah) did a good job and then T.J.(Logan) did a good job as well.”

One factor that helped the Nighthawks’ cause was the return of starting quarterback Rocco Scarfone, who missed the first game of the season with a concussion. He was sharp, completing 8-of-12 passes for 153 yards and two touchdowns.

“It felt great to be back in,” Scarfone said. “It was hard sitting on the bench and keeping stats last week.”

Scarfone was frustrated with the penalties as well, especially the holding and procedure calls against the offensive line. He said he told his linemen to step up and they really cleaned up their act in the second half.

With all the penalties, the Rams were keeping the game close despite moving the ball very little on offense.

After a series of penalties backed up the Nighthawks deep in their own territory, a 6-yard punt gave Northeast the opportunity it was looking for. However, the Rams couldn’t move the ball again and then missed a 26-yard field goal.

Northern made the Rams pay for that mistake. Taking over with less than two minutes to play in the half, the Nighthawks worked quickly down the field to score again.

Scarfone and receiver Maurice Harris provided the big play, a 52-yard pass that put the Nighthawks in scoring position.

Mohamed Khellah scored from four yards out two plays later with 18 seconds left in the half to make the score 14-0.

“I didn’t throw the prettiest pass, but Maurice made a great play.” Scarfone said.

It was the first game of the season for Northeast after it had a scrimmage last week. Northeast coach Tommy Pursley said the Nighthawks touchdown before halftime was a huge momentum shift that was difficult for his young team to overcome.

“There were a lot of momentum swinging plays,” Pursley said. “If we would have hit that field goal, it would have been 7-3. But then they hit that pass and were down 14-0 and they got the ball to start the second half and scored again. Suddenly, we are down 20-0.”

NG—Daniel Downing 41 pass from Rocco Scarfone (Kris Gafford kick)

NG—Mohamed Khellah 1 run (Gafford kick)

NG—Mohamed Khellah 57 run (kick fails)

NEG—Kyle Martin 8 run (kick fails)

NG—T.J. Logan 63 run (Gafford kick)

NG—Downing 41 punt return (kick fails)

NEG—Johnny King 13 run (Martin run)

NG—Maurice Harris 7 pass from Scarfone (Gafford kick)