Calhoun Falls Charter- 56
Trinity-Byrnes- 19 Ninety Six- 26 Dixie- Take the name of their opponent and subtract 96 Great Falls- 40 Ware Shoals- 3 Whitmire- 21 Bethune-Bowman- 9 Lamar- 36 Lake View- 34 Green Sea Floyds- 35 McBee- 7 Timmonsville- 26 Scott’s Branch- 20 Wagener-Salley- 49 Blackville-Hilda- 12 Denmark-Olar- 31 North- 3? No. 2? Guess again. 1? You’re getting warmer HKT- 32 Estill- 6 Ridge Spring-Monetta- 42 Williston-Elko- 25 Baptist Hill- 28 North Charleston- 12 Burke- 48 The Charleston Charter Academy for Fly Fishing and Aeronautics- Branchville- 42 Military Magnet- 18 Waccamaw- 28 St. John’s 6 C.E. Murray- 39 Hemingway- Seriously, who didn’t love Jami Gertz? Cross- 19 Lake Marion- 6 Breakdown- The boys from Chitlinvania made a statement on Friday night and that statement was “we’re good at football.” Wagener-Salley rolled over Blackville-Hilda 49-12 and in doing so put themselves firmly in the driver’s seat in Region III. Wagener answered pretty much any lingering question anyone may have had about them with this dominating performance. Since Coach Willie Fox turned the program around a few years ago, they’ve managed to physically out-maul even other physical mauler teams. If you want to have an old-fashioned tater-kicking contest, they’ll take your best shot and reduce you to a whimpering pile of ouch in short order, but what has generally given them problems at some point is an athletic team that can spread the field and challenge them vertically. I’ve watched highlights of B-H QB Adonis Davis and he is a really good deep ball passer. While he did run for more than 100 yards, most of that came in the first half and he was just 3-of-18 through the air. It was a 20-6 ballgame late in the first half when Wagener came up with a goal line stand as time expired. They made a defensive tweak at the half, inserting a nose guard into the line. Frankly, that’s just what you want when playing W-S, is another large, scary person on the line of scrimmage. Doing so meant the secondary had to step up but they obviously did so. The Stump Whopped All-Stars also showed off some offensive versatility. They’ve generally been able to line up and shove it people’s face hole for several years now, but I think they realize that if they want to compete with Lamar and Green Sea for a state title, they can’t be as one-dimensional as they have been. Gaige Starnes didn’t put up huge numbers throwing it, but he went for 109 yards and two scores in the air (and caught a 25-yard scoring toss from Kevin Jackson). Jackson, who is very much like what you’d get if a lightning bolt and cheetah could somehow have a baby, also had 72 yards rushing and a score on just nine carries. Jhuatieg Davis actually led the way on the ground with 104 yards. They appear to be a complete team in a way they haven’t been in the past. With Williston-Elko struggling as they are, it appears all that stands between them, a region title and that sweet, delicious number one playoff seed is Ridge Spring-Monetta. The two meet in a just a couple of weeks… With teams starting to get into or towards region play, there were only a handful of “up” games for a 1A brothers this week and the only win in those games came courtesy of Cross who knocked off Lake Marion 19-6. It’s nice to see the Trojans bouncing back after a winless 2018 campaign. They still haven’t managed to crack the 20-point barrier since late 2017, but thus far that hasn’t mattered as they’ve started 3-2. If you go back two years, they were able to manhandle people and allow Nathan Walker to step on the faces of opposing school children as one of the state’s nastiest, most physical backs. They aren’t back up to that level, but it looks like they are able to eat clock, play a bit of keepaway and get after it on defense. We’ll get a pretty good idea of just how far they’ve come this week as they battle C.E. Murray in the region opener for both. The War Eagles have one of the best defenses in Class A this year. They shut out Kingstree, Lake Marion and Hemingway, while losing to a good AA teams Lee Central and Mullins, by scores of 14-13 and 15-12 respectively. When you’re struggling on offense anyway, playing C.E. Murray is kind of like eating a block of Velveeta when you’re already having troubles making poo. For those new to this blog, I make the world’s most ridiculous analogies and that one ranks right among the worst… Last Friday featured a game of the week truly worthy of the title as Lamar edged Lake View 36-34 in overtime. Honestly, going into this one, I felt the Wild Gators would be competitive and hang around for a while, but would end up losing by three or four scores and HOLY CRAP WAS I DUMB AND WRONG. Lake View held a 20-0 lead at halftime. Lamar had a lot of self-inflicted wounds in the form of two lost fumbles and 80 yards in penalties on the night. Give some credit to Lake View too. While they didn’t crack 200 yards of total offense, they played good defense (in the first half especially), they got a special teams score and stuck to a running game that was productive if not flashy. Lamar came storming back and did so, mostly, by sticking to their ground game. Cam Galloway ran for 92 yards, Jiaquell James had 87 and Dajour Green was the ultimate finisher. He only tallied 27 yards on seven carries but four of those went for touchdowns. Oh, and he caught two passes for 93 yards and another score. So Lamar demonstrated that they can stifle even the best offenses, that they’re never out of a game, that they don’t have to get desperate and throw it to catch up when behind and that they can overcome mistakes to get a win. They’ll get serious test this week against the open enrollers from Gray. You’ll remember that Gray ended Lamar’s long winning streak last year. That was the game when Galloway was lost for the year to injury, which may have changed the entire complexion of 1A football in 2018. Lake View has now lost three straight games but it’s hard to get too concerned over that considering those came to Dillon, Marion and Lamar, the latter of those in OT. They get McBee this week, then a bye week then get another stern test when Green Sea Floyds comes to town. Quick hits- I keep talking up Great Falls and its time for folks to realize something is brewing over there near the Catawba. Well, technically moonshine is probably brewing near the Catawba, but so is some good football. After four years of terrible struggles, the Red Devils are 4-2 after a 40-3 thumping of Ware Shoals. Now, I know the last two wins have come against teams with one win between them, but Great Falls has made long road trips and absolutely taken care of business. D.J. Adams is budding into an all-state player right before eyes, with ability to play RB, QB, WR or wherever he’s needed. They have other weapons too, but pay attention to that defense, which has allowed 10 points the last two weeks. They force a lot of turnovers and make a lot of negative yardage plays. They get Camden Military Thursday at 4 p.m. (Camden has no lights) before getting a needed week off (most of their guys go both ways and are probably a little beat up) then start the region slate…Branchville is an interesting team. They stand at 5-1 but three of those wins came against winless squads and one was against Jim Bob’s Football Finishing School or some such. Still, they’ve done what good teams do against inferior competition (which is roger them soundly) and they blew out a good and very scrappy Whitmire team. They’re pretty balanced on offense with Zach Wiles offering big-time dual-threatness (is that a word, I don’t think it’s a word). They get another struggling team this week in Scott’s Branch before getting to the meat of their schedule the following two weeks (against Cross and C.E. Murray)…Can anyone tell me what’s up with Williston-Elko? I mean, you pretty much write off the up losses to Barnwell, Silver Bluff and probably even Allendale-Fairfax, but they got waxed by RS-M this past week. They are now 1-4 on the year and 7-11 since the start of last season. This is a team that hasn’t had a losing record since 2006 and for whom an eight-win season has been down year since then. Certainly, RS-M is coming on after their own slow start, but it isn’t like things get easier with Wagener-Salley up next on the schedule. Is it just the schedule? I’m legit curious for some insight. Suggested reading Do chitlins even have taters? I’ll have to look into that. If I’d said “block of cheddar” instead of Velveeta, would that have made it better? When you think “dumb and wrong” think of me I would tell you to read capsules of lots of games here and also here and read about Branchville here but it’s not like you listen to anybody. It’s talking to a brick wall sometimes, Larry.
1 Comment
kelley Lollis
10/4/2019 05:56:23 am
Believe you have that top game backwards. According to the local paper and Max preps Calhoun Falls lost by that score.
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