COLORADO CITY, TX-- The Garden City Bearkats used 24 first quarter points to take a commanding lead and a 60-14 win against defending Class 1A Division I state champ Borden County Saturday afternoon.
Borden County didn’t take long to get points on the board, as Camden Edwards ran for a 65-yard touchdown. They didn’t make the extra point, so the score was 6-0.
Garden City played so efficiently throughout the game scoring on all but two drives in the first half.
On their first drive, Amando Algeria ran for a 55-yard touchdown run plus the extra point, which brought the game to 8-6.
The Bearkat defense came up with a key fourth down stop which led to another Algeria touchdown. This one was from 54 yards. With the extra point successful, the score was 16-6.
The Coyotes struggled offensively with only 154 yards of total offensive in the first half compared to the 295 yards that Garden City produced.
After a three-and-out forced by the Bearkats the Coyotes were forced to punt. This is when Trae Jost for Garden City threw an interception to Borden County’s Tommy Kingston.
“Our eight seniors they do a good job of overcoming adversity,” said Garden City head coach Jeff Jones on his team's response to turnovers. “They’ve been here before. They’ve done it, they’re experienced and it pays off.”
Then, two plays later Nick Lara, got an interception off of the Coyotes quarterback Payton Merket.
This led to a 32-yard touchdown pass from Hunter McMillan to Hagen Halfmann to make the lead at the end of the first quarter 24-6.
The Bearkats offense just kept rolling at the start of the second with huge runs and passes by McMillan, and he capped it off with a goal line rush to score. They missed the extra point to make the lead 30-6.
The Coyotes after this drive started throwing the ball more and drove down the field only to try and settle for a field goal. McMillan blocked the attempt.
After this great play by McMillan, he ended up throwing an interception to defensive lineman Zane Allen on the very next play.
The Coyotes didn’t take long to score, as they started on their own 3-yard line. Kingston found Allen in the end zone for a 5-yard touchdown pass.
To end the half the Bearkats started with the ball with 1 minute, 10 seconds, but it only took them 25 seconds for Cirido Mier to run for a 70-yard touchdown.
At the end of the first half the score was 38-14.
The start of the second half looked like the Coyotes might stop the Bearkats when they went for it on fourth-and-30, but Algeria found Cesar Chavez for a 39-yard touchdown which brought the score to 44-14.
Garden City’s defense really put the pressure on the next drive with two consecutive sacks and the last one being a safety as the bring their lead to 46-14.
The safety punt was taken back for a 40-yard touchdown by Algeria.
At the end of the third quarter the score was 52-14.
The Bearkats started the fourth quarter with a 19-yard run by McMilin for a touchdown. After made field goal the game was over thanks to the mercy rule in six-man football.
“[The] defense played great. They kept making stops and kept giving us the ball,” Jones said of their defensive play. “They didn’t care that we gave up 14 points. They just kept on playing great defense.”
Garden City will move on to play Balmorhea next week in the regional final. No date or location has been set at the time of publication.
Subscribe to the LIVE! Daily
Required
Post a comment to this article here: