Lafayette Christian carried momentum from an impressive pre-district résumé right into a dominant performance Friday to kick off District 6-2A.
Quarterback Braylon Walker and safety Luke Green, a pair of hometown Ragin’ Cajuns-committed seniors, combined for five touchdowns to spark a 48-7 roll past nearby and familiar Lafayette Renaissance in which they found the end zone in all three phases.
“We’re in a great place,” Walker said. “There’s always much room for improvement. We didn’t play up to our standard offensively tonight, but that’s the time when the defense is going to come in. Last week the defense didn’t play to our standard, so the offense had to step up. There are going to be weeks like that. But we’re in a great place right now.
“I feel like we’re in a great place as a team, as a brotherhood. We all trust each other, we love each other and we’re gonna play for each other regardless of who we’re going up against.”
Both defenses controlled the early going, trading stuffed runs near the line of scrimmage and forced punts.
But, on LCA’s third possession, Walker danced his way free to the sideline and 35 yards to the end zone to get the scoring started.
And the Knights — in one phase or another — didn’t slow down much for the next two and a half quarters.
“I think our youth showed, and I think we made the game a little bit bigger than it needed to be,” said Lafayette Renaissance coach Hunter Landry, who previously coached at LCA. “We came out sluggish at first. I thought our defense — I know the score’s gonna seem a little lopsided, but two pick-sixes, a blocked punt for a touchdown. In the first half, we were getting stops, but we just kept putting ’em right back on the field.”
Walker finished 12-for-18 for 143 yards and a touchdown through the air and rushed 14 times for 100 yards and two scores.
The electric athlete, projected as a defensive back in college, consistently produced deflating plays on which his quickness and creativity extended plays or spun potential losses into positive plays or even points.
“He’s tough,” Lafayette Christian coach Matt Standiford said. “So, on a fourth-and-8, he sprung one for 25. And he had another one on third down. It’s funny because I joked with him last year about the Mike Vick experience… and Braylon looked at me like I was crazy, and so I had to compare it to Lamar Jackson sometimes.
“He does a good job. His eyes are always downfield. We even had one where he hit Jace Babineaux deep downfield — illegal man downfield, but his eyes are always open looking to get other people the ball. But sometimes No. 7 just has to take over, and that’s what he did tonight at times.”
Green snatched an interception early in the second quarter and dashed his way 62 yards to double the Knights’ lead to 12-0.
“It felt good,” he said. “The play we were running, I sat behind just enough so the quarterback couldn’t see me, and as soon as he released to throw the ball, I just broke on the receiver and made a great play.”
Just two minutes later, Walker hit fellow senior Brayden Allen along the right sideline, and the recent Oklahoma commit made two defenders miss, kept his balance in-bounds and accelerated his way to a 33-yard score.
Sophomore running back Caiden Bellard added a two-point conversion after the Allen score and then found the same end zone again before halftime to stretch the lead to 27-0 with a Jude Fairchild extra-point.
“I feel like we all just came together as a team,” Allen said. “It wasn’t an individual game. We all played our part. I feel like the first half we weren’t playing the best we could, and then we came in during halftime and came together as a team, noticed everything we were doing wrong and corrected our mistakes and just came out and came harder the second half.”
Junior quarterback Kennan “K.J.” Brown Jr. and senior receiver Ja’Courey Duhon put the Tigers on the board with a 49-yard strike two and a half minutes into the third quarter.
But the Knights would shut down their visitors the rest of the way and get back to stretching their lead with touchdowns in all three phases.
Walker rushed for another score, a 9-yarder, on the next Lafayette Christian possession.
Senior Draylon August provided the LCA defense its second pick-six, returning an interception 44 yards later in the quarter.
And senior defensive end Jayden Arceneaux got his hand on a punt on the first play of the fourth quarter, and Green corralled the deflected kick and returned it 22 yards to push the lead to 48-7.
“We have some playmakers on the defensive side,” Standiford said. “Luke Green is a kid that hadn’t really had a whole lot of interceptions and had one tonight, plus the punt return. Draylon August, a receiver, on a miscommunication takes one to the house. And our defense was flying around. Our three linebackers felt like they were everywhere tonight.”
Allen intercepted a fourth-quarter pass on defense to go with his two catches for 45 yards, and junior defensive back Davion Batiste broke up or was in close coverage for several incomplete passes.
Arceneaux broke the program’s career record for tackles for loss, now at 42, to highlight a disruptive performance in the box led by he, fellow senior Jaimaison Marzell, juniors Joseph Adams and Josh Wilson and sophomore Kaleb Simon.
“It was just big, big for me,” Arceneaux said. “You know Melvin (Hills III) is a big-time guy at Texas, and that was one of my goals before the season started.”
