Kaplan knocks off Southern Lab on the road

BATON ROUGE - For the second consecutive year, the Kaplan Pirates defeated the Class 1A Southern Lab Kittens. The Pirates outscored Southern Lab 13-0 in the second half en route to a 27-18 win on Thursday.
With this victory, Kaplan improves to a record of 5-2, with three games remaining in the season. The Pirates will travel to Abbeville to face the Wildcats, who have a record of 2-5, in the district opener for both teams. That game is scheduled for Thursday.
Kaplan head coach John Thompson has a history with Southern Lab, having faced them in the playoffs while he was an assistant coach for Vermilion Catholic.
“Southern Lab is the kind of team that struggles to come back if you get ahead of them,” Thompson said on Friday morning. “I told the kids at halftime to go jump on them.”
At halftime, the Pirates were trailing 18-14.
Following Thompson’s halftime speech, where he expressed his frustration, the Kaplan defense did not allow any more points and intercepted Southern Lab’s quarterback twice in the second half. Javonte Mouton and Gannon Smith made crucial interceptions that contributed to this shutout.
While the KHS defense held strong, the Pirate offense was effective as well.
“I wanted to control the clock and keep our offense on the field,” Thompson added.
The Pirates rushed for 166 yards and passed for 111 yards throughout the game. Quarterback Sabe David has averaged 100 passing yards in the last five games. He completed 9 out of 13 passes for 111 yards against Southern Lab, with his longest completion being a 37-yard pass to tight end Jacob Devoltz.
Fullback DeMarion Cormier had another standout performance, following a remarkable week where he rushed for 327 yards and five touchdowns.
In this game, Cormier rushed for 145 yards on 35 carries and scored three touchdowns. In the last two games alone, he has carried the ball 76 times for a total of 472 yards and scored eight touchdowns.
Against Southern Lab, he recorded two 1-yard touchdown runs and one 3-yard touchdown run.
In the first quarter, Cassidy Roy scored on a 13-yard touchdown run, and Gannon Smith successfully converted the extra point, putting Kaplan ahead 7-6 at the 2:20 mark of the first period. Southern Lab responded with a 54-yard touchdown pass that allowed them to retake the lead, 12-7, at the start of the second period.
The Pirates quickly regrouped and marched down the field, resulting in Cormier scoring his first touchdown, followed by an extra point from Smith to give KHS a 14-12 lead. However, Southern Lab went into halftime with an 18-14 advantage.
Other Kaplan runners combined for 26 yards on eight carries, with Jayden Hargrave having four carries for nine yards.
Jeremy Roy led the receivers with three receptions for 23 yards, while Cassidy Roy had one catch for 25 yards, and Gannon Smith had two catches for six yards.