Martinsburg rules West Virginia with 10th state football title
Martinsburg senior quarterback Murphy Clement rushed for 210 yards and four touchdowns and threw a pair of TD passes as the Bulldogs (13-0) cemented their spot as the most dominant football program in West Virginia with a 57-13 rout of Princeton (12-2) in the Class AAA championship game Saturday afternoon at Wheeling Island Stadium.
It’s Martinsburg’s 10th state title since 2010 and the first since 2021.
“Obviously, we have a lot of them,” Clement said during a postgame interview with WV MetroNews. “Add one to the list every year, that’s the goal.”
Clement gets his chance to shine
In 2021, Clement was sidelined with an ankle injury during the title game and watched as his older brother, then-senior Hudson Clement, scored a West Virgnia finals-record eight touchdowns — four rushing, four receiving — in a 62-21 win over Huntington.
“It means the world to me,” Murphy Clement said of Saturday’s victory. “I didn’t get to do it two years ago, obviously. I got to watch Hudson do his thing. It was just great to be able to have my turn with it and be able to put on for my city and put on for the rest of our players and my teammates, all of them.”
With Hudson Clement, now a receiver at West Virginia University, in attendance Saturday to watch his former team, his little brother was fired up for a big-time performance.
“That was some motivation,” Murphy Clement said. “That got me lit, got me ready for the game.”
Walker's win streak continues
The victory also capped another perfect season for Dave Walker in his return as Martinsburg’s head coach.
Walker guided the Bulldogs to their first eight state titles (2010-13, 2016-19) and then left after the 2019 championship season to become the head coach at Division II Concord University.
After leading Concord to a 9-2 record and being named the Mountain East Conference Coach of the Year in 2022, Walker wanted to come back to Martinsburg, where he’d won 56 straight games before he left.
Britt Sherman — who took over for Walker as the Bulldogs’ head coach and led them to the 2021 title — went back to his previous position as Walker’s offensive coordinator.
The team didn’t skip a beat.
“It’s amazing, the work they’ve put in and the focus they’ve shown,” said Walker after upping his winning streak with Martinsburg to 69 straight. “It’s a great group of guys, and I’m just blessed to be associated with them.
“These are things that dreams are made of. We just came in and went to work. Britt and those guys already had it set up. I’m just very thankful and very pleased to be where I’m at. I can’t say it enough.”
Bulldogs overcome slow start
Princeton struck first Saturday, taking a 7-0 lead midway through the first quarter on a 44-yard touchdown pass from Chance Barker to Dom Collins.
Martinsburg took control in the second quarter, ripping off 28 straight points in less than seven minutes. Clement scored on runs of 31 and 48 yards, and in between, he passed to Kashez Gedeon for a 21-yard touchdown. Koi Fagan capped the outburst with a 29-yard TD run to give the Bulldogs a 28-7 lead.
With 7 seconds left in the quarter, Collins scored on a 49-yard pass from Barker to make it 28-13 at halftime.
Martinsburg dominated the rest of the way.
In the third quarter, Clement scored on runs of 45 and 15 yards, and Fagan got his second TD of the day on a 12-yard run.
With 9:46 remaining in the game, Clement passed to Gedeon for a 34-yard TD to complete the scoring.
The Bulldogs’ defensive standouts included Amar Dover with two interceptions, Rashad Reid with two sacks and a blocked PAT and EJ Hendrix with a pair of sacks.
This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: Martinsburg tops Princeton for 10th West Virginia state football title
