Mitchell takes control, powers Somerville football past Rahway

Somerville head coach Matt Bloom didn't need to tell star running back Terrell Mitchell to take over on Friday. That's because the Wake Forest commit was more than ready to just that.

Mitchell matched his career high with four touchdowns, three of them coming in the third quarter, to will Somerville to a 32-16 victory over Rahway in a matchup of unbeatens in Somerville.

On each of his four touchdowns, Mitchell followed it up by successfully running for the two-point conversion.

"He wanted to control the game," Bloom said. "He wanted the game to be put on his back and carry the team. And obviously he did that. He ran really, incredibly hard and made a lot of plays."

Somerville (4-0) led 8-3 at halftime when Mitchell capped off the opening drive of the third quarter with a 3-yard TD run.

Seventy four seconds later, Mitchell struck again, returning a punt 74 yards for a TD to make it 24-3.

Mitchell capped off the third and put the game well out of reach when he ran for a 44-yard scored with 59 seconds left in the quarter to make it 32-3.

"We knew (Rahway) is very good up front. They're young, but they have some very good talent over there," said Bloom. "So we knew it was going to be one of those wear them down and stick with the ground games. Don't get away from from it, just keeping working it early. Terrell was able to step up and be a better player in those critical moments."

Trailing 8-0, Rahway cut the deficit to 8-3 on Anthony Lopez's 37-yard field goal with 2:01 left in the half. Rahway (3-1) had a chance to further cut into the Somerville advantage after recovering the ensuing kickoff, but had to settle for a field goal attempt that was blocked by Max Nuzzi.

"We talked about it all offseason that a lot of these games can come down to a play or two. We saw that last year when we lost five games by a total of 19 points," Bloom said. "A huge play like that going into the half gave us some momentum, knowing we would get the ball coming back out of (halftime)."

Jaquan Robinson and Jaylyn Cooper ran for fourth quarter touchdowns for Rahway.