Niceville's dreams shattered in championship game (VIDEO, PHOTO GALLERY)

ORLANDO – All season long, the Niceville football team had terrorized opponents with its propensity to pop off big plays, all the while doing so with a regularity very few teams could match.

On Saturday in the Class 4A state championship game at the Citrus Bowl in Orlando, something strange happened.

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Big plays remained the theme of the day, but this time it was top-ranked Niceville that found itself in the rare position of trying to play catch-up.

On the strength of a 187-yard and three-touchdown performance by Dwyer running back Matt Elam and an attacking and opportunistic defense, the No. 2 Panthers handed Niceville a 42-14 defeat in front of 4,901 mostly maroon-clad fans.

“Today, we didn’t play our best but I don’t know if we would have played perfect we could have stayed with them,” Niceville coach John Hicks said. “I thought they were that good.”

Dwyer (14-1) trailed only once, when Niceville (13-1) answered a 6-yard touchdown run by Elam on the Panthers’ opening possession with a second-quarter scoring drive that was capped by a 29-yard pass from quarterback Kyle McDorman to receiver Kody Williams.

From that point, the Panthers scored 30 unanswered points to claim a 36-7 advantage that sealed the state title. It was the first for Dwyer.

Dwyer’s deluge of points began when, on the first snap of its ensuing possession following the Niceville score, Elam burst through the heart of the Eagles’ defense for a 69-yard score.

Niceville’s hole only deepened at the 7:16 mark in the second quarter when Williams lost his grip on the ball after making a catch and Dwyer’s Layton Haynes pounced on the loose ball at the Eagles’ 46. Seven plays later, it was Elam again ripping off a long run, this one 26 yards in length to give the Panthers a 20-7 lead after the missed point-after.

Through the first two quarters, Elam had gashed Niceville’s defense for 181 yards and three touchdowns on just 10 carries, good for an average of 18.1 yards per carry.

As fast as Elam and the Dywer offense racked up points, the Panthers’ defense was just as impressive in holding Niceville to seven points in the first half and hemming in the Eagles’ two star players.

Williams finished with four catches for 52 yards and one touchdown while Finch ended his Niceville career with 148 yards rushing and one late touchdown with 17 seconds left.

“They were mixing up coverages good and disguising everything,” McDorman said. “They were coming off the edge and bringing a lot of pressure. They were just making plays.”

McDorman, who was sacked four times and picked off once, finished just 9-of-27 passing for 100 yards as Dwyer’s relentless scheme kept the Eagles’ offense off balance for much of the night.

“A couple of plays, as soon as the ball was hiked, they were in the backfield,” Niceville running back Spencer Pullen said. “They’re a pretty fast defense.”

“The problem was going to be handling their speed on defense and that was the key,” Hicks said. “We had some drives but you can’t break any plays because of their team speed. Everything had to be so perfect.”