Prince George's 3A/2A/1A
Hardy is in the middle of the action
Gwynn Park ball hawk notches 3 touchdowns, drops 2 interceptions
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As Gwynn Park's players awaited their postgame huddle on Monday, Yellow Jackets senior Curtis Hardy took a little ribbing from an assistant coach, prompting the wide receiver and cornerback to look down at his hands and shake his head.
He could accept the teasing about two dropped interceptions because the plays he didn't make were outnumbered by those he did -- specifically, three touchdown catches in the first half and a pick on defense that helped seal the 14th-ranked Yellow Jackets' 35-14 win at 19th-ranked Douglass.
"I'm a ball hawk," said Hardy, whose touchdown catches of 40, 4 and 44 yards staked Gwynn Park to a 21-14 lead at halftime. "When the ball's in the air, I say it's my ball."
Asked about the dropped interceptions, which both came in the second half, Hardy shook his head again and said: "Concentration. All concentration. I was thinking too much about running before I caught the ball.
"I left a lot of good plays on the field. But I also came back and made plays."
The battle between the undefeated Prince George's County teams had two distinctly different halves. In the first, Hardy's touchdown catches from quarterback Marc Lucas were nearly matched by Douglass, which got a three-yard touchdown run from Emmanuel Lewis and a 13-yard scoring pass from Taitor Reynolds to Will McKenzie.
But in the second half, Gwynn Park (7-0) shut down the Eagles (6-1), and Yellow Jackets running back Khalek Shepherd took the offensive baton from Hardy.
After running just six times for 43 yards before the break, Shepherd had 14 carries for 168 yards in the second half as Gwynn Park pulled away with a pair of fourth-quarter touchdowns. The latter came on an 85-yard run by Shepherd shortly after Hardy intercepted a deep pass near his team's goal line.
"In the second half, we just started getting it done," said Shepherd, who totaled 211 yards on the ground.
Gwynn Park Coach Danny Hayes said there is still plenty for his team to work on -- the Yellow Jackets had 12 penalties for 73 yards -- but opposing teams learned they must now come up with game plans to stop both Shepherd and Hardy.
"Curtis is a playmaker," Hayes said. "We hadn't shown him, pretty much all year. We were keeping some things locked [up], and we still haven't shown a lot. But we know Curtis can do that."
