Where's Cal Hayes?That's what most of the
5,000 fans were wondering midway through the second quarter of West Rowan's 28-7 win over
East Rowan
The Mustang sophomore flash was on the sidelines,
nursing an injured knee.
"On their second kickoff, I went down and
somebody landed on it," said Hayes afterward, looking down at his left knee.
"Ithink I'll be alright. I'm going home to ice it."
The injury occurred early in the second quarter.
After five runs, he had 28 yards.
"I wanted to go back in," said Hayes.
East coach Jeff Safrit said no way.
"If it had been 21-7 or 21-14, he probably
would've gone back in," Safrit said. "But the way it was, we didn't want to risk
anything. He's too young."
n
NOWWHAT? With Hayes out, Thomas Hendrickson and
Chris Faavesi playing defense and Jason Powles complaining of a hurt shoulder, Safrit had
nowhere to turn.
"I didn't have any backs left," he said.
WEST
West Rowan coach Scott Young said he was going to
do whatever needed to be done to get the ball in Scooter Sherrill's hands.
But starting him at quarterback?
There was Sherrill lining up under center Daniel
Kluttz on the opening series of West's 28-7 win over East Rowan Friday. In fact, on first
down, Sherrill ran for 20 yards. He ran on second and third downs before regular QB Jared
Barnette entered the game and threw to Sherrill on fourth.
"Teams are doing a great job of shutting him
down," said Young. "We've got to come up with more and more wrinkles. Because he
is such a tremendous athlete, we've got to get the ball in his hands."
NORTH
After back-to-back losses to unbeatens West Rowan
and Kannapolis, the Cavaliers may have been resting a little too easy when facing
Salisbury Friday night.
The result was a lackluster 12-6 lead at halftime
and a fired-up Hornets squad that played some of its best football of the season before
North pulled away for a 30-12 victory.
"Salisbury played hard, you have to play
against them or you're going to get beat,"North head coach Roger Secreast said.
"I think we were pressing a little bit offensively at the start, and all I said at
halftime was for them to relax."
And while the Cavs weren't real pleased with how
they were playing, they weren't overly concerned about the 0-6 Hornets staying with them
the whole way.
"Coming in we expected it to be a good game,
we expected them to play hard this game,"running back Jamel Alexander said. "But
I knew we would come back, we just had to buckle down and concentrate."
Salisbury
The 336 yards gained by North Rowan may seem like
a lot, but Hornets head coach Raymond Daugherty liked what he saw from his defense,
especially after allowing just 130 yards in the first half.
"I was pleased with the
defense,"Daugherty said. "North provides a lot of different problems in a lot of
different ways. Last year we couldn't get close to Mario (Sturdivant), this year we hit
him some."
Sturdivant got his revenge for those early hits,
finding Alfonzo Miller for long passes in the second half including scoring plays of 39
and 38 yards. The North QB finished with 214 yards passing but was 11-for-23 and threw an
interception.
"Late in the game I think the kids were tired
from chasing Mario and that accounted for the deep balls,"Daugherty said. "Those
weren't open early."
SOUTH ROWAN
Led by junior running back Keith Garrett, South's
Raiders had their second-best ground game of the season in a 27-21 homecoming loss to
Northwest Cabarrus.
The Raiders, who rushed for 315 yards two weeks
earlier in a 31-0 romp over Salisbury, got 226 on the ground against Northwest.
Garrett, who had four runs of 12 or more yards,
had 114 yards rushing for his second 100-yard game of the season. He had 139 against
Salisbury.
Garrett also had 178 all-purpose yards, including
49 on kick returns and 15 on a pass reception that kept South alive in the final minute.
"He's the kind of kid you get the ball in his
hands something can happen," said Vanhoy of the pass to Garrett by quarterback Tim
Cook that, combined with a facemask penalty against the Trojans, put South on Northwest's
48 for the Raiders' final offensive play.
Cook, who threw for two touchdowns to wide
receiver Jesse Kirkman earlier in the game, also tried to hit Garrett on his final pass
after another wide receiver, Daniel Pinyan, was covered near the sideline. Northwest's
Robert Williams intercepted it.
"He's still in a learning process," said
Vanhoy of his second-year quarterback. "We haven't been in many games like this. We
can work on it in practice, go over and talk about it, but until you do it under the
lights, it's a whole new ball game."
Cook has thrown for five TDs this season, four of
them to the 6-4 Kirkman.
wonder notes
Central Cabarrus hit for three touchdown passes in
the final 4:39 in its 34-31 loss to Kannapolis on Friday night, only one fewer TD toss
than the Wonders had allowed in the season's first 235 minutes, 21 seconds.
Central QBClayton Russell shredded the Wonders for
14 completions and 223 yards in the second half, after being held to four completions and
32 yards in the first.
Wonder coach Bruce Hardin blamed the Wonders' pass
rush-- or lack thereof-- more than he did the secondary.
"You give a good quarterback that much time,
and he'll pick you apart," said Hardin.
n
PRACTICEMAKESPERFECT: None of the Wonders were
pleased with the way they finished Friday's game-- especially on Senior Night, which
usually brings out the best in everyone.
"We're all very disappointed with how we
played," said quarterback Justin Hardin. "We started the week on Monday with
what may have been our worst practice of the year, and maybe it just carried over."
DAVIE
Ricky White needed just a little bit of help
Friday night in Davie's 14-11 loss to North Davidson.
The senior running back rushed 23 times for 158
yards in the first half alone, but he was contained to 58 yards on 17 carries in the final
two quarters. The reason was simple, according to War Eagles head coach Doug Illing.
"They couldn't stop us running, but he got
tired,"Illing said. "We had to find other ways and rest him. He's a horse, we
tried to mix in the pass . . . Ricky knows he's the man, he's our go-to guy.
"He's really stepped up as the leader of this
team." |
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