Freshman Red Beats Guyer 22-15

What a game Thursday night! It didn't look good for the Texans in the beginning with Guyer scoring a safety on our first possession, and our first 8 offensive plays resulting in 4 penalties, said safety, and a fumble. And I won't get into the officiating here other than to say it was less than stellar. A point to which the faithful, exceeding Guyer's in excitement and nearly in number, would attest. The Texans, however, showed a tremendous amount of heart in persevering! And little did we know that such a rocky start would portend such a frenetic first half of football...

The Texans finally got on track with a connection from Cade Garner to Chase Morrison that went for 31 yards. Although the drive eventually fizzled, the next drive led to a Morrison reverse for 21 yards and a touchdown. Northwest added another touchdown when Cameron Watkins stayed with a tipped pass from Dusty Cloud and took it 71 yards for the score. The game remained close as the defense struggled early, allowing 216 rushing yards in the first half, leading to two touchdowns for Guyer and a 15-14 lead. But on the first play of the next drive, Reggie McDaniel would break free on a 63 yard race down the sideline for a touchdown, part of a 104 yard day on 12 carries. The back and forth of the first half would end in stunning and fitting fashion, with the Texan defense stuffing a quarterback sneak at their own one yard line to preserve the lead.

The defense would continue that momentum into the second half, allowing no points and only 39 yards of total offense for the rest of the game. Enough cannot be said of the job the offensive and defensive lines did against perhaps the largest fronts we have faced. I'm quite sure Guyer expected their size to wear our boys down in the second half, but it turned out just the opposite, with our offense registering two key first downs to run out the clock and allow us to take the victory formation for two snaps.

Truly a great team effort on both sides of the ball. The defense was led by Duke Kicinski with 6 tackles, Sammy Jennings with 5, Joe Gonzalez with 4, and Cameron Watkins, Jacob Parker, Tristin Demargosian and Chase Morrison, each with 3.