MIAMI, Fla. – Miami Northwestern delivered another emphatic statement on Saturday night that the best of high school football still runs through South Florida.
The Bulls brought down the curtain on the 2024 season with a 41-0, running clock romp over Raines in the Class 3A state championship game at Pitbull Stadium. The Vikings were playing in their sixth state title game and first under head coach Donovan Masline. But it was Northwestern, led by retired NFL quarterback and first-year coach Teddy Bridgewater, that collected its state championship medals underneath an on-again off-again rain in front of an announced crowd of 12,000.
Recommended Videos
It was a stunning finish for the Vikings, who entered as the No. 1 seed in Class 3A but couldn’t account for the aerial firepower of Northwestern. Masline, who had been an assistant during three Raines championship games (2015, ‘17-18), said the Vikings were well prepared for the game but just couldn’t capitalize on the few opportunities that they had.
“Definitely using this as motivation. Sometimes it happens, you know, a loss happens,” Masline said. “So, we just have to learn from it. Develop our strong mindset to continue to drive and get better, going into the next year. And you know, we’ll come back even stronger. We’re going to soak it in, you know, take this loss on the chin. It’s gonna hurt, but you know, we can learn from it and get better.”
The Bulls (12-2) won the eighth title in program history and served notice once again across the state that the most competitive football is played in South Florida. Among the seven classifications, four championships were won by teams in Broward and Dade counties — Chaminade-Madonna (1A), Northwestern (3A), Plantation American Heritage (4A) and St. Thomas Aquinas (5A). Another, Class 6A, was won by Palm Beach County’s West Boca Raton.
Of Raines’ three losses in championship games (1973, 2015 and 2024) all have been to teams from the 305 area code.
“We got to just get better. You know, get better just continue to learn how to finish,” Masline said. “You know, we got to finish the mission. We didn’t come out and play our best tonight. I felt like the kids were prepared all week. We had a great trip. Everybody was on point with time management. So, you know, they came out there with the better team tonight. And you know, it happens.”
Leon Strawder diced the Vikings defense for four passing touchdowns and 361 yards through the air, a 48-yarder to Nicholas Lennear late in the third quarter triggering the running clock.
Raines (13-1) had plowed through the season with a high-powered offense of its own but found yards difficult to come by against the Bulls.
The Vikings had a shot at tying the game in the second quarter, going from their own 7 all the way to the Northwestern 1. But the Bulls dragged TJ Cole down at the 1 on both third and fourth down to deny the Vikings their best scoring chance of the game.
Raines had another shot near the end of the half with a fourth-down toss from Cole to a wide-open Adron Walker inside the 20 that was a hair underthrown. Walker slipped trying to make the grab but was clear of any Bulls defender. Right after that, Strawder hit Calvin Russell Jr. on a short sideline throw that he turned into a 29-yard field flipper. Seven plays later, Strawder found a leaping Russell in the corner of the end zone for the highlight reel grab.
The Vikings went three and out on their first drives and had a 25-yard run on a fake punt by Eddie Hinton wiped out by offsetting personal fouls. The Bulls punched in a 3-yard scoring run by Elijah Hardy and were in position to go up another score on its ensuing drive. But Strawder’s pitch to Hardy on fourth and goal was too high Raines swamped him for a loss.
Cole and Walker had been an elite duo all season long. But Walker was banged up after sliding for a catch and had just 20 yards in the game. Cole, who entered with 43 touchdown passes and needed four to tie the area record of 47 set by First Coast’s De’Andre Johnson, was just 6 of 19 for 45 yards and an interception.
While Raines’ defensive line erased most of the running lanes, that didn’t matter with how well Strawder played. Two of his touchdowns went to the 6-5, five-star wideout Russell. Hardy had a 65-yard touchdown catch to open the second half. Lennear led all players with 121 yards receiving and a 48-yard touchdown catch in the third quarter that triggered the running clock.
“Got to keep our head held high. We’ve got to take it on the chin. We put ourselves in this situation. We just got to play better,” Masline said. “To the seniors, I want to thank them for the foundation that they laid this past season. And then for the younger guys coming back, just got to work harder, get better on both sides of the ball, get better individually and you know, get ready for next year.”