Three fourth-quarter touchdowns from Thomas leads St. Mary's past Crockett

By SCOTT M. BURNSTEIN
Special to The Oakland Press

DETROIT — Plenty of fun in the sun awaits Orchard Lake St. Mary's Earnest Thomas in the coming years as the 6-foot-2, 200-pound senior is set to travel out to the West Coast this summer to start his college football career at UCLA.

Thomas sat squarely in the spotlight after rushing for a game-high 167 yards and three touchdowns in the Eaglets' 21-8 victory over Detroit Crockett Saturday, in a Division 3 regional championship game played under bright and balmy conditions at Detroit Osborn High School.

“Really, all the credit today and for this whole last run of wins, goes to my offensive line,” said Thomas, the son of a former NFL player and legendary Detroit Public School League coach. “These guys have stepped it up for the playoffs, and I've followed their lead. They're creating the holes and I'm hitting them hard. In the first half, we had way too many mental errors, but we cleaned it up in the second half and turned it around in a hurry.”

Coming into the playoffs with a .500 record, St. Mary's has now reeled off three straight wins, all in convincing fashion. The Eaglets improve to 7-4 overall on the year and advance into a state semifinal contest against De Witt next Saturday. The victory over an athletically-gifted and offensively-explosive Crockett team, led by quarterback and Michigan State recruit Tony Lippett, gives the Eaglets their second regional crown in the last three years.

In 2007, St. Mary's lost in the Division 3 state final in an epic, five-overtime showdown with East Grand Rapids. Many members of this year's Eaglet squad are holdovers from the 2007 team.

“I wasn't sure if we were going to make it into the playoffs or not, but once we did, we've been coming on strong. This was a great game for us. We showed some resiliency after making some costly early mistakes and kept playing hard and getting after it. When we finally punched one in, it felt good,” OLSM coach George Porritt said. “Then, our special teams and Ernie (Thomas) took over.

Getting some major-league help from his special teams unit, Thomas notched all three of his touchdowns in less than a four minute span in the early fourth quarter to break open a scoreless tie and provide St. Mary's a 21-0 lead with 7:22 remaining on the clock.

Thomas' 5-yard score at the 10:53 mark of the fourth quarter put the Eaglets ahead 7-0. Mike Gilliam's recovery of a fumble on the ensuing kickoff return set up Thomas' next score, another 5-yard jaunt into the end zone with 8:59 left to play. Yet another fumble by Crockett on a kickoff return — this one recovered by Brandon Powell — set the stage for Thomas' final scoring run of the day, a 9-yarder that proved the death blow.

The cat-quick Thomas, penciled in as a safety at the next level by the UCLA coaching staff, has scored three touchdowns in all three of the Eaglets' playoff wins, giving him a robust total of nine so far in the 2009 postseason. Of his 167 yards, 109 came in the second half of play against Crockett.

“Ernie's a tough back. He's a senior and I'm not shy about giving him the ball in games like this. He runs so hard and he's difficult to take down. The offensive line did an outstanding job of lead blocking too,” said Porritt, who likes how his team is coming together. “Next week will be a tough one. De Witt's probably one of the best teams in the entire state, regardless of division. I'm sure we'll be ready.”

Crockett scored with less than a minute and a half to play on a 4-yard touchdown connection between Tony Lippett and Ashley Gaines, but it was too little and much too late. The Eaglets defense, led by junior Marcus Gleaves' three quarterback sacks and seven tackles, kept Lippett — coming off a seven-touchdown outing in Crockett's district title win over Hazel Park last week — in check for most of the game.

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