It just so happens that Kaleb Cole’s number matches the amount of consecutive times Newport Central Catholic has defeated Newport on the football field.
The Thoroughbreds senior made sure the streak continued on Friday night, recording four rushing touchdowns as NewCath defeated Newport a 26th straight time, 35-7.
Cole finished with 102 rushing yards on 18 carries, also adding two sacks on defense.
He honestly had no clue how many times in a row they’ve defeated their inner-city rival.
“We were holding up 25 because I thought it was for Class of ’25 or something,” Cole said.
Cole’s efforts caught the eyes on the stat line, but it was a full team effort. The Thoroughbreds outgained the Wildcats 276-128, 59 of those Wildcat yards coming on the final drive of the game when it was 35-0.
Newport QB Kyle Lee was sacked five times and couldn’t find many open receivers, finishing 9-of-16 passing for 108 yards when he wasn’t having to avoid a plethora of Thoroughbred defenders in the backfield.
“Mental mistakes break us down and that’s been the Achilles’ Heel of this team and we’re still trying to work on the mental part of the game,” Widcats coach Paul Wiggins said. “The Achilles’ Heel all year for us has been up front and they were blitzing off the edge and inevitably we had trouble holding our waters and Kyle was getting pinned in.”
Cole had two rushing touchdowns in the second quarter to make it 14-0 at halftime. He added another with 7:44 left in the third and the final one coming on a 10-yard bruising run and a 28-0 lead with 9:30 to play.
“It felt really good,” Cole said. “It’s just really good to get a win, especially coming off three losses. It’s good to get back in the win column.”
Cole’s bruising style mixed in with Eddie Bivens speed made for quite the 1-2 punch as they combined for 162 of the Thoroughbreds 249 rushing yards. Cole provided the thunder, Bivens brought the lightning.
“It’s our o-line. They give us the boost and help put us where we need to be,” Bivens said. “I don’t think anyone can stop us, other than ourselves. I honestly think that. If we don’t beat ourselves we can beat any team from here on out.”
Emmanuel Miles added 51 yards rushing, the majority of those coming on a 38-yard touchdown run to get the game to a running clock with 6:04 to play.
The ‘Breds averaged 6.4 yards per carry, NewCath coach Stephen Lickert making it a point of emphasis to run the ball on the evening, doing so 39 times to just seven pass attempts.
“We challenged our guys,” Lickert said. “Newport did a good job stopping Lloyd’s run, and we said, we’re going to run the ball. If we’re going to be really good, we’re going to run the ball. We just challenged our guys all week to go run the ball. Backs hit holes and they were great. Our line created gaps and when they didn’t create gaps, our guys gained a yard still. And that’s what it’s all about.”
For the Wildcats, it’s their second straight loss after a 4-0 start. This loss a little more costly being a district game. All is not lost however, still controlling their own destiny for a home playoff game if they take care of business the next two weeks with wins over Bellevue and Dayton. That destiny begins Oct. 18 at Bellevue.
“We knew this was going to be a tough one, but we have a season laid out ahead of us still,” Wiggins said. “We’ve got two games to position us here for a home playoff game here and we’ll see what happens.”
NewCath will now be the heavy favorite for the top spot in the district and something they set themselves up for when they play the schedule they do the first six games. They’ve played three ranked teams (Lloyd Memorial, Conner, Raceland) in those first six contests which consisted of playing a 6A, two 5A, 3A, 2A and 1A football teams.
“Those teams challenged us and showed us what we’re not good at so we can fix that,” Lickert said. “It’s not about winning those games, obviously we want to win those games because RPI is a joke. But we want to learn so we can win these games later on. We learned about what we need to fix.”
They return to action on Oct. 18 at Dayton.
More photos from Friday’s contest at Newport, a slideshow provided by Charles Bolton:
THOROUGHBREDS 35, WILDCATS 7
NEWPORT CENTRAL CATHOLIC — 0-14-7-14 — 35
NEWPORT — 0-0-0-7 — 7
Scoring Plays
2nd Quarter
(NCC) Cole 4-yard run (11:06) Collopy kick
(NCC) Cole 1-yard run (4:55) Collopy kick
3rd Quarter
(NCC) Cole 6-yard run (7:44) Collopy kick
4th Quarter
(NCC) Cole 10-yard run (9:30) Collopy kick
(NCC) Miles 38-yard run (6:04) Collopy kick
(N) Buck-Barber 1-yard run (:42) Reynoso kick
Game Stats
Passing Yards: NewCath 27 (Miles 3/7), Newport 108 (Lee 9/16, INT)
Rushing Yards: NewCath 249 (Cole 18-102, Bivens 9-60, Miles 6-51, Collopy 5-28, Ford 1-8), Newport 20 (Thompson 8-26, Roper 1-1, Buck-Barber 1-1, Lee 10-(minus) 8)
Receiving: NewCath (Kraft 1-22, Cole 1-3, Ford 1-2), Newport (Holder 1-34, Buck-Barber 1-27, Thompson 1-24, Farrell 3-16, Roper 2-0, Sharp 1-7)
Turnovers: Newcath 1, Newport 2
Penalties: NewCath 1-15, Newport 6-39
Records: Newport Central Catholic (4-3, 1-0), Newport (4-2, 0-1)