GREEN COVE SPRINGS – Three interceptions; Alexis Stilianou, Jenna Hill and Ciera Zino, boosted a strong offensive presence for the Clay High flag football team that trampled Ridgeview High 42-0 in the district 4-1A championship game played Thursday at Clay High School.

Clay, a Final Four finisher last year and still unbeaten at 11-0, advances to host Terry Parker High on Thurs., May 2. The Blue Devils were ranked seventh in Florida prior to the district tournament and third in Class 1A. “We want to go back to the Final Four after last year’s game was a little humbling,” said Clay coach John Stilianou. “I think they were a little overwhelmed at the game last year. This year, we want to go knowing what it will feel like.”

For Clay coaches Jared Moses and John Stilianou, the win was the third consecutive district title for the Lady Blue Devils and the 11th in a row for 2019.

“How can you not have fun with a bunch of girls that play their hearts out on the field,” said Stilianou, who handles most of the defensive calls with Moses barking offensive signals. “These girls are very smart about football the game in general and bring that intelligence back to me from the field. All we ask them to do is to do their job. The rest will come. It’s pretty simple.”

From the opening whistle, Ridgeview, though, looked like they wanted to spoil the Clay party with defensive rusher Jhatarra Sampson sacking Zino on a second down rush that later forced a punt on the Blue Devils’ opening possession.

“We wanted to see what they were going to do on the line and then make adjustments,” said Clay quarterback Zino. “I scan the field and see where they are lined up, then have an idea who should be freed up.”

On the Panthers first offensive series, quarterback Brittany Sutton, with 35TDs for the season, got stung with back-to-back sacks from Clay rusher Brooklyn McClain, who terrorized the Panther offense all night with teammate Hannah Agee crashing the backfield from the opposite side of the Ridgeview center.

“We knew their quarterback liked to run out of the pocket and we set up a deep rusher and a soft rush that mirrored the quarterback to keep her from breaking downfield,” said Stilianou.

With a touchdown strike to Stilianou, who had Clay’s first interception on a pass attempt downfield to Ridgeview wideout Trenity Gilford, to end the first quarter, Zino dialed in her attack mode for the rest of the game and accounted for two more touchdown strikes; one to Stilianou and a third to Abby Hawkins to push the score to 21-0 at the half.

“I think the first interception of the game set the tone for us on defense,” said Moses. “There’s only so much a team can do defensively and we knew they would try to play man-to-man and we adjusted when we saw that.”

In the second half, it was all Zino who took an interception by Hill on Sutton’s first throw of the half with a scoring run to 28-0, then snagged her own interception off two deflections in a crowded slant pass by Sutton with 7:17 left in the quarter. Zino scored off her own interception with a scoring run around right end to put Clay up 34-0 with four minutes to go.

Zino got one more with a 60 yard scramble to paydirt for the final 42-0 score.

“I’ve never run that far unless I’m chasing food,” said Zino. “I get to run around all my sisters at the house, so this was like that.”