Douglas Santo is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Basha High School for AZPreps365.com

Senior quarterback Demond Williams Jr. led Basha 80 yards on three plays in just over a minute on its opening drive Friday night, and the defending state champions were off to 48-14 win over Sandra Day O’Connor.

Basha scored first and it was a one-sided affair from that point on as the Bears scored four first-quarter touchdowns and 48 first-half points. The Bears shut out the Eagles in the first half to lead 48-0 going into halftime. That would be the end of Williams’ night, as the offensive reserves got playing time in the second half.

“I was happy with our execution. You talk about explosive plays, we had 12 in the first half, and that’s what we shoot for,” head coach Chris McDonald said. “I’m just really proud of our kids and the type of execution they had.”

Williams completed 15 of his 16 pass attempts for more than 350 yards and six touchdowns in the first half, leading to an astounding 93.75 completion percentage.

“We have a lot of athletes with a lot of speed, and our line did a really good job pass protecting tonight,” McDonald said. “They gave Demond time, and he was obviously able to find guys open down the field, doing what he does.”

Adding to his passing attack, Williams ran for 54 yards and a touchdown. On the Bears' second drive, he scrambled for 42 of those yards, spinning out of two defenders’ arms at the line of scrimmage and leaving the crowd stunned into silence as he scampered near the goal line.

“[Dual threat] opens up the complete offense, so we can do whatever we want to,” Williams said. “As long as we execute our stuff, everything should happen according to plan.”

Many players on the offensive side of the ball had big days, but junior wide receiver Gio Richardson had a career day in just the first half. After returning a kickoff 98 yards for a touchdown a week ago, Richardson had six catches for 116 yards, both marking new milestones for the second-year varsity receiver.

“I know that I need to keep going, it’s not going to get me too high,” Richardson said. “I have to keep having that drive to keep getting better.”

While all eyes were on the explosive offense for most of the night, the defense recorded its second straight first-half shutout, holding the Eagles to 78 total yards in the half.

“They played their hearts out, they did their stuff,” Richardson said. “Obviously holding them to zero in the first half.”

The defense allowed just 60 rushing yards in the first half and three first downs. The Bears forced a fumble and three three and outs for the Eagles' offense.

The Eagles did score two touchdowns and gained 145 yards in the second half, but a couple garbage-time scores didn’t change the outcome; the game was won at halftime by the Bears.

“Our gameplan was to come in and shut down the run, we knew they kind of wanted to play bully ball a little bit,” McDonald said. “So, I was really proud of our physicality up front and shutting down the run and taking them out of what they do and putting them in the spread.”

Basha will face Brophy College Prep on Sept. 28 for its final non-region game.

“We have a short week next week, so we have to come out and execute,” Williams said. “We need to stay sharp and take it one game at a time.”

Basha will host Brophy, the Bears’ first home game in four weeks. The last home game was Basha’s lone loss of the season, to Highland.

“It’s our first home game in a long time and last time we played at home we lost,” McDonald said. “So, we better be pretty hungry about it.”