By Bill Woodward

Correspondent

RALEIGH – Backup quarterback Brian Miller played a leading role for Millbrook on Friday night as the Wildcats ended a tough season on a high note.

Miller, lined up at slot on the game’s first play from scrimmage, slipped into the backfield and took a lateral from quarterback Lamar Harris. Miller then hit a wide-open David Robinson for a 57-yard touchdown pass to get the Wildcats off and running toward a 51-7 victory at the Eagles’ Len Bauer Stadium.

Miller wasn’t done, however.

When Harris was banged up on the last play of the first quarter, Miller came on and threw a 19-yard touchdown pass to Andrew Ezebuiro on the very next play. And he kept it up for the rest of the game.

For the game, Miller, who had thrown just 11 passes entering the season finale, completed 14 of 17 passes for 213 yards for four touchdowns and ran for another score.

“You have got to be prepared for any situation,” Miller said. “It felt great. Our starter is a really good friend of mine. I felt bad for him. But it felt great to go out and get a really good win after a tough season.”

The Wildcats, a team with a strong football tradition, finished just 3-8, 2-5 in the Cap Eight 4A Conference. Enloe finished 1-10, 1-6 in the conference.

“I’m proud of our kids,” Millbrook coach Clarence Inscore said. “We’ve had a tough season and it hasn’t gone the way we wanted it to. But those kids have stayed together and worked hard. They believed in themselves. We finally played a complete game tonight and they looked good doing it.”

Before leaving the game, Harris completed six of seven passes for 83 yards and a touchdown to Corey Cooper, a senior who has committed to Louisville. That gave Harris 1,046 yards passing for the season.

Inscore said Harris was injured on a running play to end the first quarter, so he turned to Miller. Both quarterbacks are juniors.

“Harris got banged-up, nothing serious, so we went to Brian,” Inscore said. “He has played a little bit this year. It was good for him to get some experience. He looked really good. He played well.”

Millbrook looked good in all phases.

Junior running back Daminick Wilkins rushed for 122 yards on 15 carries. The senior receiving trio of Cooper (four catches, 55 yards), Ezebuiro (eight catches, 98 yards) and Nigel Griffin (four catches, 69 yards) all had big games. And kicker Jarrett Cervi booted a 35-yard field goal with 4.7 second left in the halt to give the Wildcats a 31-0 halftime lead.

Enloe scored on its first possession of the second half, recovering a Millbrook fumble on a punt and

moving 24 yards in three plays. Quarterback Dwayne Pernell got the TD on a 3-yard sneak.

Enloe first-year head coach Mike Massey was looking ahead to next year after the loss.

“Our key is moving forward,” he said. “We are going to spend this offseason looking at all of our games and see what we need to do as far as personnel that we have coming back and who is coming up.”

For Millbrook, it was time to enjoy a big victory that helped take some of the sting out of a losing season.

“We played good defense all night,” Inscore said. “It was a well-balanced game. I’m glad we got to end the season on a note like this.”

And so was Brian Miller, a backup who stepped up big-time when called upon to take over for the Wildcats.