VIDEO: Fernandez’s early defensive score sets tone as Lower rolls to shutout victory in Anchor Bowl

Posted: September 13th 2025

By BRIAN CUNNIFF

CapeAtlanticLive.com

CAPE MAY COURT HOUSE – The Lower Cape May Regional High School football team dropped anchor on frustration at the hands of its biggest rival Friday evening.

The Caper Tigers scored on John Fernandez’s 35-yard interception return on the second play from scrimmage and never looked back in rolling to a 42-0 victory over Middle Township. The win was Lower’s first over Middle since the 2017 season. The Panthers had won 11 of the past 12 games against Lower going into the contest.

“This is something we’ve been working hard toward,” Lower coach Billy Damiana said. “The kids have put a lot of work in. We’d been pretty successful in our scrimmages and obviously in our first game, but then we got punched in the mouth (in a 28-7 loss to Gloucester) by a no-nonsense, tough team last week and we had to rebound. We went back to basics a bit with a camp-style practice all week and the kids really got after each other. I think we all realized that’s the standard and what we have to do moving forward. The kids bought in. I want them to enjoy this.”

They certainly did.

At the final whistle, Lower’s players ran through the end zone and claimed the Anchor Bowl trophy that was perched on a table below the scoreboard. They celebrated in front of their student section before taking group and individual photos with the trophy.

Fernandez got Lower off to a fast start by corralling a tipped pass and racing 35 yards for a score only a little more than a minute into the game.

“That was fantastic because it set the tone of what we wanted to do,” Damiana said. “We said from the get-go that if we didn’t get the ball first, let’s try to score on defense. We felt we had to score first. That was huge for us to make that happen.”

After the teams traded a couple of possessions, Lower took complete control of the game by scoring three times in the final 3 ½ minutes of the first half. Quarterback Dave Douglass, easily playing his best game of the season so far, finished a 12-play, 46-yard drive with a one-yard scoring run to make the score 14-0 with 3:29 to go in the second quarter. After Middle punted, Lower scored again with 1:05 left in the half on Ryan Mallon’s seven-yard run to finish a five-play, 41-yard drive. 

A Mallon interception followed by a wonderful 53-yard catch and run by Fernandez set the Tigers up to score again, and Alex Nelson found the end zone from 10 yards out on a reception from Douglass with 25 seconds remaining in the half.

Lower further exhibited its dominance immediately after halftime by executing a 15-play, 55-yard drive that took almost 8 ½ minutes off the clock and ended with another one-yard scoring run by Douglass.

Ashton Ray finished the scoring with a 10-yard touchdown run early in the fourth quarter.

In addition to his two touchdown runs, Douglass finished as Lower’s leading rusher with 67 yards on 12 carries. He also completed 8-of-11 passes for 116 yards and another score. He completed passes to six different receivers.

Mallon added 59 yards on 15 carries for the Tigers, who rushed for 190 yards as a team. He also had two interceptions on defense.

Lower Cape May kicker Britton Walls made all six of his extra-point attempts, making him 12 for 12 on extra-point tries for the season thus far.

Middle (0-3), which started four freshmen along with a handful of sophomores, recorded just two first downs in the contest.

Middle still leads the all-time series, 66-38-4. The teams first played one another in 1922.