Motivated Bishop McDevitt starts strong against Central

SPRINGFIELD >> Just at first glance, Bishop McDevitt doesn’t look like a young team anymore.

The Royal Lancers are a little bit bigger, stronger and faster all over the field, the results of a very dedicated offseason and summer. Last year, they may have caught some foes by surprise, but this isn’t a team that’s going to be overlooked this fall.

It’s the reason the players put in all that work and Saturday, they got their first chance to show off the results as the defeated Central Philadelphia 42-7 at Springfield Township.

“Oh my God, I was just waiting for it,” McDevitt junior quarterback/safety Lonnie Rice said. “I stayed up all night just watching film until morning because as soon as I stepped on the field I wanted to know everything they were doing and go right at them. I wanted to get them from the jump.”

Rice is the one guy who probably best represents the growth McDevitt has made under head coach Mike Watkins, now in his third year. The junior, whose weight room gains are visibly noticeable, started to tap into his potential last year but still had his moments where he showed his youth.

Noticing that a lot of guys on the team, even upperclassmen, were looking up to him, Rice decided to mature and get more serious both with football and his academics. Teammates are still coming to him for advice on everything from passing routes to homework and the co-captain has embraced that role as a leader.

His work also paid off on a bigger scale as Rice picked up an offer from Army over the summer.

“Seeing Lonnie in the weight room every day, it forces me to look at Lonnie and say I want that work ethic,” sophomore wideout Joachim McElroy said. “That’s what I want. He’s up there, he’s one of the best football players I’ve ever played with.”

“He’s a natural-born leader,” Watkins said. “Guys just seem to flock to him, he’s got that personality, that leadership quality, and he does it. He shows it on the field, in the weight room and in the classroom and there’s a reason why he’s being a highly-recruited player.”

McDevitt also has a lot of guys who play both sides of the ball, which is a product of numbers but not something Watkins minds. He wants the team’s identity to be built on its defense, so having Rice and most of the team’s solid offensive line playing defense is a benefit.

Saturday was a typical first game, with the Royal Lancers doing some things very well but also having some sloppy moments.

“It started up front, we did a good job up front getting movement and we executed,” Watkins said. “There were some sloppy plays, we have to clean up some penalties but all in all, we played hard and played together.”

Rice ran for 76 yards and two scores while completing 4-of-6 passes for 53 yards. Sophomore tailback Jon Luke Peaker rushed for 142 yards and two scores while McElroy scored on a 42 yard punt return and a 44 yard option toss.

Now that the coaching staff and players have had a few seasons together, it’s all business at this point. Watkins said he tries to step back, facilitate and let his guys take the lead while Rice and McElroy said it’s a lot easier to just get to work right at the start of a practice.

In that same vein, Rice and his teammates did a lot of their lifting and workouts on their own during the offseason. Once a few guys lined up a time, the calls and texts went out and players were showing up to put the time in.

“No one expected us to be anything last year but some people are saying we’re supposed to do something this year so they’re looking at us as competition,” McElroy said. “That’s just going to push us in practice to work harder, learn what they’re going to do and take it to the next level.”

McDevitt led 35-7 at the half, then scored on its first drive of the second half to put a running clock into effect. The defense, led by Sean Stanton, Andrew Metro, Richard Cotton and Lawrence Richardson, didn’t give Central much all afternoon.

Richardson, a bruising 6-foot-2, 215-pound senior, has been a tremendous leader in his own right. Watkins called the team a “well-rounded” group and added there’s an earned respect across the board between players.

“The one thing we learned is that when you build that chemistry in the offseason, it helps during the season,” Rice said. “We’d meet up to do a lift or go work out on the field and it helped us in the season. We executed as a team better and allowed us to have each other’s back.”

Last year, the Royal Lancers jumped out to a 4-0 start but as McElroy noted, they lost more than they won after that. There were a couple close losses in there that stung, but every loss impacted this group the same way.

Rice was able to visit West Point over the summer and took some of his teammates along for the trip. He feels his offer was the door opening not just for him, but every guy on the roster to prove all the work they’ve been putting in can take them places.

The next step for the Lancers is to show it on the field. While the smaller of the two PCL divisions, the Blue may be tougher top to bottom and there won’t be an easy week for McDevitt once league play starts.

That’s OK with the Lancers.

“The first thing I said was ‘McDevitt is back,’ this opened an opportunity not just for me but my team now,” Rice said. “A lot of schools may not see McDevitt because we’re a little school, or when you hear McDevitt, you think of the one in Harrisburg. Well, I don’t want them to think of Harrisburg, I want them to think of Wyncote so I think that helped put us back on the map.”