PALM BAY For the third time in Dan Burke’s career as Palm Bay head football coach, the Pirates finished a regular season unbeaten.
BJ Daniels of Palm Bay (21) gets a block and heads into the open field during Friday’s game against Heritage.
With a 38-0 win over rival Heritage on Friday, Palm Bay improved to 9-0 a week before the team will start the Class 5A regional playoffs at home against Eustis.
After a scoreless first quarter, turnovers and field position helped the Pirates take control. Then, the long ball broke it open. Stuart Brown completed passes of 32 and 53 yards to Dez Arthur along with a 40-yarder to Tyrese Lyons.
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While those were all on target, perhaps the most impressive was a bullet of a touchdown pass in the final minutes from the 10. Arthur took in the pass as he was drilled but held on to the ball to turn a comfortable win into a running-clock game with six minutes to play.
“It was a great feeling,” Arthur said. “It’s one of the biggest rivalries in the city, and we’re friends with a lot of those guys.”
Arthur and Lyons got behind the Panthers defense for their two longest catches.
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“We noticed they were bringing their safeties up every time we were running the toss,” Arthur said, “so we faked the toss.”
Arthur’s 53-yarder capitalized on a Heritage fumble near midfield a minute into the final period. Lyons dove to catch his 40-yarder, landed on his head at the 3 and held on as well. That set up one of two touchdown runs by B.J. Daniels.
Ken McKay scored the other Pirates touchdown, and Justin Bellows connected on a 32-yard field goal.
McKay also played a part a key early play. An 18-yard run to midfield by Heritage quarterback Willie Gaines turned into an opportunity when McKay’s tackle dislodged the ball. Javonn Roberson, who later made an interception, picked up the fumble in stride and ran to the Panthers 43. That led to the first Pirates scoring drive, late in the first half.
For Palm Bay and Burke, it was the year he passed 200 wins as Pirates coach, and it was the year the program returned to the top of the district standings after looking up at Merritt Island the past three seasons.
Palm Bay came into the game ranked fourth in 5A and will host Eustis the same night Merritt Island visits the fifth-ranked defending champion, Bishop Moore. The two winners will then play on Nov. 18.
Against Heritage on Friday, Brown passed for 170 yards, including scoring tosses of 53 and 10 yards to Dez Arthur.; Heritage: Amarion Gaines led the Panthers with 75 all-purpose yards.
Heritage completed its season at 5-4.
Contact McCallum at 321-242-3698 or bmccallum@floridatoday.com. Follow facebook.com/FLtoday.brianmccallum and @Brian_McCallum on Twitter.
PALM BAY 38, HERITAGE 0
PB 0 7 14 17 – 38
Herit 0 0 0 0 – 0
2nd Quarter
PB: B.J. Daniels 7 run (Justin Bellows kick), :59
3rd Quarter
PB: Ken McKay 4 run (Bellows kick), 9:10
PB: Daniels 3 run (Bellows kick), 4:55
4th Quarter
PB: Bellows 32 FG, 11:47
PB: Arthur 53 pass from Stuart Brown (Bellows kick), 11:02
PB: Arthur 10 pass from Brown (Bellows kick), 6:08
Individual statistics
Rushing: PB – McKay 15-44, Daniels 13-44, Arthur 1-7. H – Amarion Gaines 15-59, Willie Gaines 7-51, Nicholas Barber 4-8, Jayquan Martin 4-5, RaShard Farmer 1-1.
Passing: PB – Brown 8-13-0 170. H – W. Gaines 5-12-0 62, Matt Allaire 0-1-0 0, Tyree Parks 0-1-1 0.
Receiving: PB – Arthur 5-116, Tyrese Lyons 1-40, McKay 1-4. H – A. Gaines 1-22, Barber 1-20, Brian Nieves 1-11, Lawrence Santos-Sim 1-8, Jason Miller 1-7.
High school sports | floridatoday.com/sports/high-school-sports/
Willie Gaines of Heritage loses the ball after being hit by Palm Bay’s Ken McKay (7) in the second quarter.