Hornets defense takes on tough Panthers offense

This fire in Beatty was not started by a lightning strike. Neither the Beatty Fire Department nor Carl Olson could put out this fire started by the Beatty Hornets football team, who are just too hot to handle at the moment.

Last week against Quest Academy last Friday night the Hornets blasted the Quest Academy Knights 54-12. The Hornets improve to 2-1 overall and 0-1 in league play.

The Hornets had 17 carries for 136 yards on the ground. Luis Flores, the Hornets quarterback, was 7/8 for 59-yards passing. The leading rusher for the Hornets was also Flores, who had 85-yards rushing for three touchdowns. He was followed by Jhonpaul Adujar who had seven carries for 51 yards. The leading receiver was Jacob Oseguera, who had five receptions for 44 yards.

Hornets Coach James Robertson was more than satisfied with his team’s performance. “Against Spring Mountain we didn’t capitalize on the opportunities to score. We are playing really good defense and obviously the Panthers will be the best offense we have faced,” he said.

The team can’t relax because they have to travel to Pahranagat Valley to play the Panthers this Friday night at 7 p.m. The Panthers have the longest winning streak going. At the end of last season the streak was at 69 games. The Panthers have added three more games to this year to make it 72. Last year the Hornets lost to them 58-14.

Could the Hornets break the streak? Can the Hornets defense withstand the Panthers offense? Anything is possible with football.

Robertson is not worried about how his team matches up. He stressed that his team will just play Beatty football. Pahranagat he said is a well-disciplined team with good technique. He then emphasized his team is disciplined too and has not had a big problem with penalties. “Our team does not get penalized much. The Panthers are more of a finesse team. I am not going to change much. I have preached all year defense, and gang tackling. So far, all three games we have done that. We have given up a couple of big plays. Two big plays to Quest. There was one play where the Quest team snapped the ball over the QB’s head and half of our team went to go tackle him and over-pursued and he was gone.”

The coach said his team has had no problems playing on the baseball field. The coach said the temporary goalpost has not come into play yet. “No one has needed it. We have not even attempted a field goal yet, but we may have to against Round Mountain or Tonopah. When the time comes we might have to move down to the other side to just to kick the field goal,” he said.

Tonopah: The Muckers lost to Pahranagat Valley Panthers 56-13. It may have been a devastating loss, but the team is not down nor are the Muckers out. The season is just the beginning and there are other teams to play still.

For Tonopah player Jimmy Withers, playing in the first League game against Pahranagat Valley was a challenge. Withers loves a good challenge. “It definitely helps to play the defending champs to see how well we match up against them,” he explained. “As a unit, we were prepared for Alamo. We knew coming into this game what to expect and that it wasn’t going to be easy. We also knew if we wanted to win we couldn’t have any mistakes on either side of the ball, and as it happens, that team is well coached and they find ways to get what they want.”

Alamo was what the Muckers expected, a great football team that controlled the game from the very beginning to the end of it. The clearest evidence of this was the score at the halftime, 0-42.

The Muckers didn’t admit defeat, but fought back. “I feel we played a good game against them holding them to 3rd down a lot, but allowed the big plays,” Muckers Coach Duffy Otteson said.

The Panthers took advantage of the Muckers mistakes. “We needed turnovers and we also needed to be able to throw the ball better. Alamo was able to get mismatches and execute,” Otteson said.

Vinny Bagarose (overall), Kyle Dennis (offensive) and Jeb Ayers (defensive) were selected as the players of the game. The linemen for the Muckers, Ian Guthridge, Kekoa Elliot, Tyler Kirkland and Kyle Dennis did a good job blocking for the QB and running backs. “Connor did a great job throwing and running when he needed to, and the defensive unit did well, other than a few big plays. Ian did good getting pressure and Koa did great off the sidelines filling in when Scotty went out. Jeb and Brendan filled the holes right and had good stops against the run and corners, they did good on coverage,” Withers explained. Next game is at Sandy Valley at 7 p.m.

Alba Amoros contributed to this story.