Florida High School Football: Port Charlotte wins first region title in program history

Heading into Friday night’s Florida High School Athletic Association (FHSAA) Class 4A, Region 3 final, the Port Charlotte Pirates were chasing unchartered territory.

In program’s 44-year history, the Pirates have never advanced to the state semifinal stage of the season. Well, until Friday night.

UCF commit Logan Flaherty threw a touchdown pass to fellow junior Elias Pearl in the waning moments as the Pirates upset the Jesuit Tigers on the road, 22-21, at Corral Memorial Stadium in Tampa.

Port Charlotte now awaits who they will play in the Class 4A state semifinals, which could be either Orlando Jones, Plantation American Heritage or Choctawhatchee.

It may have taken 44 years to reach a state semi, but it took just 48 minutes to accomplish the feat behind one of the top quarterback-wide receiver duos in the Sunshine State.

After mostly a scoreless first half of play, Florida commit Will Griffin scored on a 7-yard touchdown run with just 46 seconds left before intermission. The second half is where the action began to pick up offensively for both teams as Port Charlotte took a 7-6 lead on a Pearl 3-yard scoring run.

Jesuit grabbed the lead right back on a Hezekiah Davis touchdown run to put the Tigers ahead 14-7. Some back and forth scoring put Jesuit ahead 21-14 in the waning moments of the game, but Port Charlotte would get one more crack at it after recovering a Jesuit fumble with 42 seconds left in the game.

The rest will go into Port Charlotte football lore as Flaherty chucked up a 55-yard pass downfield to Pearl, who just got behind a Jesuit defender, for the touchdown. Pirates’ head coach Jordan Ingman decided to go for 2 and the win, with Pearl connecting with Mikael Santa for the go-ahead points and what would eventually be the win.

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