Walton overwhelms South Walton with flurry of scoring (PHOTO GALLERY, VIDEO)

SANTA ROSA BEACH — The Walton football team dumped a season’s worth of frustration on county rival South Walton on Friday.

Coming into the game, the Braves knew their postseason fate was in Pensacola Catholic’s hands, but they certainly played like a playoff-bound team on Friday.

The Braves flooded the overwhelmed Seahawks with their high-flying offense, crushing South Walton 43-7 to kick off a three-day stretch that will define the course of their season, because the best news of the night for Walton came after the game.

Click to view a photo gallery from the game »

The Braves (3-6) learned after the win that Pensacola Catholic topped Chipley 35-21 on Friday, which triggers a three-team shootout for District 1-2B's second playoff spot. Walton will face Marianna in the first quarter at 7 p.m. Monday at Chipley, and the winner will take on Chipley in the second quarter.

This year’s iteration of the county rivalry game, the first since 2006, carried with it no immediate postseason implications for either team, but the Braves came out with something to prove following a number of difficult losses this season.

The overwhelmed Seahawks (8-2) bore the brunt of the Braves’ attack. Walton now sports a 5-0 record over South Walton.

“It was a good game for our guys who needed to come out and play well,” Walton coach Lenny Jankowski said. “Obviously we were a little disappointed in our effort last week (in a lopsided loss to Wakulla) and I think our kids responded this week and came back and played very well and played very hard, and that’s good to see.”

Walton scored in bunches in the first half, including an 80-yard Tray Williams run as time ticked off directly following South Walton’s only score. The Braves took a 36-7 lead at halftime. Williams finished with 114 yards on 13 carries.

“Tray’s the type of runner that if he gets out in the open he can turn the jets on and take it the distance,” Jankowski said.

Liam Miller threw three touchdown passes to three different receivers of 22, 43 and 45 yards in the first half en route to a 29-0 lead out of the gate. He finished 15-of-26 for 240 yards, three scores and no interceptions.

“The team came out and played hard from the start, and we just finished them off when we had to,” Miller said. “It feels good to get this win.”

South Walton got on the board in the dying moments of the half when quarterback Dennis Smith connected with an outstretched Andrew Priest in the end zone for a 17-yard score, but Williams’ run a play later killed whatever momentum it created.

“We didn’t come out and play our best,” Priest said, “We kind of let Walton the name get to us, that they’re bigger than us, have more athletes than us, just have more overall players than us, and they don’t (have to play both offense and defense) like we do so they had the advantage there.

“They were probably less tired than us so they just ran all over us.”

The Seahawk offense had trouble establishing the running game that’s led them to the playoffs and a one-loss District 1-A regular season record. The talented Walton front line held the Seahawks to just 23 rushing yards in the first half, and by the second half they had too much ground to make up to rely on it with any consistency.

Jay Gatto finished with 45 yards on nine carries to lead the Seahawks, while Smith was 6-of-19 with 102 yards, a touchdown and an interception.

“Once we were able to get some stops early on, obviously it takes them out of their game-plan a little bit and that was our game-plan going in,” Jankowski said. “If we got up, we knew it would take them out of their game-plan a little bit and fortunately we were able to do that.”

Walton 43, South Walton 7

SW                  0                      7                      0                      0—7

Walton           8                      28                   7                      0—43

First quarter

W – Corliss Stone 22 pass from Liam Miller (conversion good); 10:04

Second quarter

W – Tray Williams 45 pass from Miller (Alex Brack kick); 10:24

W – Craig Darity 43 pass from Miller (Brack kick); 7:09

W – Williams fumble recovery in end zone (Brack kick); 2:08

SW – Andrew Priest 17 pass from Dennis Smith (Jonathan O’Hara kick); 37.2

W – Williams 80 run (Brack kick); 0.0

Third quarter

W – Marrion Holmes 1 run (Brack kick); 3:58

                                                   W                        SW

First downs                          14                      9

Rushes-yards                        30-187             29-99

Passing yards                       271                  111

Comp./Att./Ints.                 17-30-0            8-21-1

Fumbles-lost                         2-1                     2-1

Penalties-yards                     6-45                 4-30

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING— Walton: John Querisma 1-28, Steven Myrick 3-19, Tray Williams 13-114, Liam Miller 6-28, Caleb Cole 3-(-13), Justin Dorsey 4-11. SW: Chris Shock 9-23, D.J. Striedel 2-10, Dennis Smith 7(-8), Jay Gatto 9-45, No. 12 2-29.

PASSING— Walton: Liam Miller 15-26-0 240, Caleb Cole 2-3-0 31, Steven Myrick 0-1-0 0. SW: Dennis Smith 6-19-1 102, Dylan Asbury 1-1-0 9.

RECEIVING— Walton: Corliss Stone 3-32, Levi Schipper 1-16, Brandt Ellenberg 4-60, Quamille Williams 1-5, Tray Williams 2-29, Craig Darity 4-67, Martin Lilland 2-31. SW: Jay Gatto 3-45, Benny Spencer 2-31, Andrew Priest 1-17, Michael Elliot 1-9.