Hickory Slips Past Sharon In Showdown 21-19

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Shane Lux | September 13, 2025

Sharon – What else would you expect?

In Mercer County’s version of the backyard brawl, Hickory stopped a 2-point conversion with 1:05 to play to clinch a dramatic 21-19 victory over Sharon.

With the victory, Hickory improves to 4-0 for the first time since 2020.

“You know, work hard and good things happen,” said Hickory head coach Bill Dungee. “I think you create those opportunities, and that’s what we did, to be 4-0 in the season. We haven’t achieved that since my second year here. Our schedule doesn’t get any easier. I can’t lie. I was probably saying a couple of prayers over there, looking for an opportunity for our guys to make a play, but let’s keep fighting. Our thing is hard work, dedication, and discipline, and sometimes just fight, fight, fight.”

The Hornets and Tigers have a long history of playing fantastic football games against each other. Consider the two rivals playing in consecutive District 10 championship games in 2023 and 2024.

Or Sharon’s 20-14 victory over the Hornets in last season’s regular season contest.

You can add Friday night to the list of great games played between the two schools, and we may not be done yet in 2025.

While holding a precarious 21-13 lead in the fourth quarter, Kelvin Morrison’s second consecutive lost fumble gave Sharon the football at their 41-yard line with 5:01 to play.

The Tigers then drove 59 yards in 12 plays, scoring on Terrian White’s 3-yard run with 65 seconds to play, pulling them to within 21-19.

On the ensuing 2-point conversion, quarterback Ethan Engelmore faked a dive up the middle, rolled out to the far side, and threw a pass into the arms of Kenyon Smith, who couldn’t come up with the catch that would have tied the score.

“Obviously, they’re an excellent football team,” said Sharon head coach Jason McElhaney.

“They got a really talented tailback there, and their quarterback played well for them tonight. So credit to them, but our tackling was really, really bad, and thankfully, we could get a couple turnovers to make this thing close. We had a chance to tie it up there. That’s something we practiced a lot, but ultimately didn’t execute it.”

It was a slew of mistakes like that that would plague Sharon all night long as Hickory’s Christian Dungee recovered the onside kick to seal the victory.

“Once we got the lead, we made two great defensive stands, and we got the ball back,” Bill Dungee said. “We gotta put the game away. We focus on the four-minute drill, which is all about protecting the ball. We’ve got to be better there, but sometimes things happen. It seemed like every time we had an opportunity, we dropped the interception. We tip the ball here, but it’s just a fight. Sometimes you gotta fight, sometimes you’re gonna win ugly, and I told the guys they’re gonna make plays. We’re gonna make plays, stay with it, be mentally and physically tough, and they did a great job with that.”

When Terrian White scored his first touchdown of the night from 16 yards out with 43 seconds to play in the first half, following a 59-yard drive, a bad snap from center on the extra point kept the score at 13-7.

White led the Tigers with 154 yards on 20 carries.

That 13-7 lead was taken into the locker room. Though not without dealing Hickory a significant blow, as on the succeeding kickoff, Jadon Phillips raced into Tiger territory, but on the tackle, he would break his ankle and have to be taken to the nearby medical center.

Coming out for the second half, Hickory forced a punt in three plays and then proceeded to drive 90 yards in ten plays with Christian Dungee scoring on a 7-yard run at the 8:22 mark of the third stanza.

Dungee, along with tailback Kelvin Morrison, did literally all the heavy lifting for the Hornets as they were the only Hickory ball carriers all game long and combined to rush for 313 yards, including 206 in the second half.

Christian Dungee rushed for a career-high 133 yards on 18 carries and completed 5-of-9 passes for 17 yards.

“It just feels amazing,” Christian Dungee said. “It felt ike it was just energy in the second half. Yeah, the energy was not that good in the first. In the second half, we just brought it. We did it for our brother, Jadon, too.”

While Kelvin Morrison again did his thing, gaining a game-high 180 yards on the ground, including 140 in the second half, along with two touchdowns.

His 36-yard sprint early in the fourth quarter gave Hickory the 21-13 lead following a 7-play 73-yard drive.

Sharon twice drove to the Hornets’ 27 and 28-yard lines in the second half, but was turned away on downs on both occasions.

Things started well for the Tigers; however, they held on downs at their 19-yard line on the opening possession of the game and then marched 81 yards in six plays with Gha’fir Lampkins dropping a pass right into the bucket of Kare’mez Norris for a 33-yard touchdown to open scoring.

“I thought we had a great start and then couldn’t sustain that out of the locker room,” McElhaney said.

“Credit to them, they made some adjustments, did really well. They did a nice job. They played better defensively in the second half, but I’ll be very honest. We’re continuously our own worst enemy until we can somehow figure out how to get out of our own way. These things are gonna happen. You can’t beat good teams when you’re trying to compete against that team and yourself.”

Like Hickory, the injury bug bit Sharon as well, with Lampkins leaving the game early in the third quarter, not to return.

The offense was then given to Ethan Engelmore, last year’s starter, who has been battling injuries this season.

In relief, he completed 7-of-16 passes for 70 yards.

Hickory evened the contest at seven, 48 seconds into the second quarter. Morrison capped a 9-56-yard drive with a 5-yard run.

The Hornets will now shoot for a 5-0 start when they host winless Erie next Friday night.

“We got 6A Erie, and we got Canfield right after this,” Bill Dungee concluded.  “We just got to keep grinding, keep playing hard and making plays. Hopefully, our guys can get a little bit healthy this week, and we can get back on it to keep working towards our goals.”

Sharon, meanwhile, will look to bounce back as they take the short trip to Farrell next Saturday night. A game that PaFootballNews will be covering.

Game Highlights:

Hickory 21 Sharon 19

Score by Quarters

Hickory – 0 7 7 7 – 21

Sharon – 7 6 0 6 – 19

Scoring Summary

First Quarter

S – Kare’mez Norris 33 yd pass from Gha’fir Lampkins, (Yousef Kanan pat), 4:16 – 6-81

Second Quarter

H – Kelvin Morrison 5 yd run, (Callum Darraugh pat), 11:12 – 9-56

S – Terrian White 16 yd run, (rush failed), 0:43 – 9-59

Third Quarter

H – Christian Dungee 7 yd run, (Darraugh pat), 8:22 – 10-90

Fourth Quarter

H – Morrison 36 yd run, (Darraugh pat), 10:42 – 7-73

S – White 3 yd run, (pass failed), 1:05 – 12-59

Individual Stats

Rushing: H – Morrison 24-180, Christian Dungee 18-133. Totals: 42-313. S – Bishop Root 4-21, Lampkins 7-13, White 20-154, Rakeem Hughes 1-32, Team 1-(-12). Totals: 33-208.

Receiving: H – Morrison 2-3, Jadon Phillips 3-14. S – Norris 4-87, Hughes 1-6, Root 3-8, Logan Perks 1-8.

Passing: H – Dungee 5-for-9, 17 yards, 1 INT. S – Lampkins 2-for-5, 39 yards, 1 TD, Ethan Engelmore 7-for-16, 70 yards.

Interceptions: S – Hughes.

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