Malik Washington certainly has a gift for luring the best receivers.
If the senior quarterback hadn’t talked to Myles McAfee at a camp over the summer about transferring out of St. John’s to Archbishop Spalding, the Cavaliers might not have been celebrating a statement 26-10 victory over DeMatha on Saturday night, under the giant Baltimore Ravens logo trotted out for the inaugural Cavaliers Kickoff Classic and Ravens Rise game.
“He’s a connector, that Malik,” Spalding coach Kyle Schmitt said.
That midsummer meeting ultimately led to a tide-changing 27-yard connection from Washington to McAfee in the third quarter — the catalyst to Spalding’s go-ahead touchdown. Their end zone corner completion in the fourth iced the win.
It looked like a well-tested trick quarterback and receiver had waited to pull out for weeks — Washington feinting a pass to running back Antonio Leadbetter, leading most of the Stags defense with him, just to dash to the right and flash a slippery pass to McAfee instead.
But it wasn’t planned at all. Washington’s known for his chemistry with his receivers over the years, borne of vast experience working together. He’d just started working with McAfee not long ago. And yet, the two read each other in that moment like it was their thousandth throw together. It might’ve been.
“They’ve just been doing reps, reps, mindless reps, even, but a lot of them,” Schmitt said. “That connection happens.”
Spalding football (2-0) has had no shortage of confidence boosts these past three years. When the Cavaliers beat Gonzaga two years ago, it added its first Washington Catholic Athletic Conference victim to a growing pile of program achievements. DeMatha is now the second.
But when Washington and his team closed a 7-3 first half, the Cavaliers were still long off from their dominant victory.
“All the long summers prepare us for these second-half games,” Washington, who accounted for two touchdowns, said. “It’s about who can really stay there the longest. And I think tonight, we proved we’re ready to go all four quarters.”
Confidence isn’t something foreign to Washington, the two-time Capital Gazette Player of the Year, two-time Rhodes Trophy winner, and the most famous county player of the summer after committing to Maryland in July. But even he knew, once DeMatha flipped the lead four minutes into the third quarter, he had to prove himself again.
Stags quarterback Denzel Gardner carved a path fairly easily downfield under pounding rain and earned the lead-changing touchdown he’d been seeking all game. By then, Gardner had shouldered most of the offensive burden himself, to which Spalding’s defense had no answer.
“We were stalling. [McAfee] dropped one earlier, but I knew he was going to get up for me,” Washington said. “Had to get back to him, had to make a play, so that’s what I did. I trust that kid.”
Washington’s first bit of wizardry with his receiver turned the tide at exactly the right moment. Leadbetter’s touchdown – a 6-yard rush following McAfee’s receptions – secured a 14-10 advantage.
And if that didn’t sap the will from DeMatha, the defense did.
Junior defensive lineman Zack Philpott contributed to nearly every tackle on the Stags’ attempted response, even dragging Gardner down for a loss. Another set of downs later, Spalding’s defense not only forced DeMatha to opt for a punt, but jolted the Stags into pumping a little too much energy into the snap. The ball sailed into the end zone turf for the first of two safeties.
Trent Gillis, Ben Ligouri and 2023-24 Male Athlete of the Year Delmar White added their own sacks, while White later bowled into Gardner for another safety.
“You sit down and figure out what calls will get us in the right plays and eventually you find it, correct some things,” Schmitt said. “It’s a chess match, and we just have to make our changes quickly and we’ve been able to do that early on.”
Emboldened by their defense and swelling lead, confidence radiated from Spalding’s offense, every rush and pass burning the Stags defense before them in complete contrast to the first half. Leadbetter cut for a 33-yard rush, then Washington for 22 yards. After his touchdown connection to McAfee, Washington met freshman Kam Miller for a two-point conversion against traffic to make it 24-10.
“We’re pretty simple on offense, but we have a lot of answers,” Schmitt said. “We just gotta find the answers. Faster we do that, faster you see the success we had today.”