Football: Week 8 Preview

St. Anthony's (7-0) @ Iona Prep (6-1), Saturday, 1:30 p.m.

This match up could be a preview of an upcoming playoff battle.  Both teams have 6-0 league records and sit 1st and 2nd respectively in the rankings.  The Friars are coming off of a 38-13 win over Holy Trinity last week, while Iona Prep defeated Xaverian 49-13.

St. Anthony's is looking to keep its undefeated season alive, but it'll have to get past Iona Prep's high-powered passing offense led by quarterback Timothy Perley.  Perley leads the league with his 72% completion percentage and should keep the Friars secondary busy all game. 

St. Anthony's will have the edge in this game so long as it can keep up its productive rushing attack.  Senior quarterback Charlie Raffa and junior running back Brian Sherlock are both averaging an impressive 11 yards a carry.  In the end, this game will be decided by defense and these are two of the league's best as Iona has allowed only 207 yards per game to St. Anthony's 238.

Prediction: St. Anthony's 28, Iona Prep 21

Islip (7-0) @ Huntington (5-2), Saturday, 1:30 p.m.

 Huntington is coming off a 38-6 thumping over struggling Easthampton, but they'll have a much tougher task ahead when they play an undefeated Islip team that is beating opponents by an average of 17 points per game.  Huntington has shown that it has the ability to win close games and it has a tremendous asset in Matt Curley, as good high school kickers are hard to come by.  Curley showed the ability to kick for decent yardage in the clutch with his game winning 31-yard kick against Eastport-South Manor. 

Islip quarterback Jeffrey Craig's ability to pass the ball as well as run it will be difficult for the Blue Devils to contain.  Last week Craig threw for 175 yards and 2 touchdowns and ran for 135 yards and a touchdown.  The Blue Devils defense will have to take their game to the next level if they want to stay in this game.

On the other side of the ball, Huntington hasn't had difficulty scoring points, averaging over 28 a game.  This game looks like it may be a shootout, but Islip should come out on top.

Prediction: , Islip 34, Huntington 24

 Longwood (5-2) @ Walt Whitman (1-6), Saturday, 1:30 p.m.

Walt Whitman's struggles continued last week against Central Islip, getting shut out 20-0.  This is a program that is in the process of rebuilding, but scoring only 6 points over its past 2 games gets frustrating for any team.  Longwood suffered its  second loss of the season, but it came against undefeated football powerhouse Sachem North.  Whitman will try to pull of the upset and earn its second win of the season.  It will be a difficult task to try and cope with Longwood's talented rushing attack of Davonte Booker and Kavaughn Wiggins.

The Wildcats have to improve their game starting at the line of scrimmage, where they've been getting pushed around all season.  If they can do that and get into any sort of rhythm offensively, they have a chance to hang with Longwood, but their lack of depth hurts them and they'll have to play a mistake-free game.

Prediction:  Longwood 28, Walt Whitman 13