Published: September 07, 2008 12:28 am            

Noble rolls in Tecumseh

Prep football notepad

Noble opened its season against Tecumseh Friday. If there were any odds placed on a high school football game, the Bears would have been the favorites.

Noble coach Ray Crawley admitted as much before the game, as Tecumseh was just 3-7 the year before and had been struggling for years.

So when the two teams lined up Friday, it was all Noble, as the Bears rolled 34-13.

It was expected, so Noble isn’t going to let the win go to its heads.

“We are not at the point where we can just show up and expect to win football games,” Crawley said. “Everyone would love to be at that point, but we are truly not there yet.”

Looking ahead, Noble has a realistic shot at starting 2-0. The Bears host Chickasha Friday. The Chicks were just 4-6 last season and opened the season with a 55-0 loss to Shawnee.

But Noble isn’t doing any scoreboard watching.

“To be honest, we have a shot at starting 2-0,” Crawley said. “We’d be disappointed if we didn’t. But we can’t look at scores. We’re going to have to fight for every win we get.”

Friday at Tecumseh, running back Brandon McElhaney rushed for 181 yards on just 12 carries and scored three times on runs of 44, 35 and 17 yards. Quarterback Chad Davidson rushed for 76 yards on eight carries and completed 6-of-9 passes for 75 yards and scored on a 25-yard run and threw a 31-yard touchdown pass to Will Starr.

The Bears led 20-7 at the half and were pretty much in command the entire game.

“Mostly, we played pretty well,” Crawley said. “We had a little lack of focus in the second quarter, but by the fourth quarter we were able to shuffle in a lot of kids. A lot of kids got some reps, so that’s always good.”

Blanchard falls

in opener

Blanchard went into the season with a quarterback battle and ended up using two against rival Bridge Creek Thursday. Either way, the Lions failed to produce enough offense in a 9-7 loss.

Blanchard’s two quarterback system wasn’t enough.

Senior Bryce Rusler started the game under center and was 5-of-7 for 54 yards passing. He rushed for 23 yards on 11 carries. Junior Blake Stringer was 11-of-28 for 127 yards and rushed for minus six yards on three carries. Stringer had Blanchard’s only touchdown, connecting with Dalton Dolezal for a 68-yard touchdown pass.

“I thought they did a good job,” Blanchard coach Jeff Craig said. “The thing that killed us was that we had too many dropped passes. The passing game was there, we just couldn’t catch the ball. We had six or seven dropped passes.

“Defensively, I thought we played well. Really, this is one of those pride games. We were hoping to earn a little respect with this game. This isn’t a devastating loss by any means. Our guys are resilient and we’ll bounce back.”

CCS humbled

Community Christian School started the season 1-0 with a convincing win over Christ Prep Academy of Kansas City Aug. 30th, but a true test was Friday at Class A’s Ringling. The Royals found out quickly just where they stood when Ringling posted a 45-8 win.

“It was very disappointing,” CCS coach Brooks Mosier said. “They were simply a better football team. They just totally dominated us.”

Quarterback Chris Potter scored the Royals’ only touchdown on a 2-yard run in the fourth quarter. Taylor Daniels hauled in the two-point conversion from Potter.

CCS, now 1-1, should get back in the win column when it hosts Class 2A’s Seeworth Friday. Seeworth was 0-10 last season and lost to Riverside Friday 15-14.

But the bad news is CCS lost two linemen in the loss to Ringling. Senior Cruz Culver and sophomore Heath Thomas went down with knee injuries. Whether or not they will be out for the season won’t be known until later this week.

“That’s a big blow to us,” Mosier said. “Those are good players. You hate to see that.”

Tough start

for Purcell

Coach Mike Wilson doesn’t put much stock in non-district games. The real season starts in the fourth week when the Dragons play at Madill to start district play.

So dropping the first game of the season isn’t such a tough blow. The Dragons lost at Lindsay 38-34. Lindsay scored on a 13-yard pass late in the fourth quarter to win.

“We made a lot of mistakes, but they are correctable mistakes,” Wilson said. “I thought we did a good job of coming back, but we just made too many mistakes.”

Purcell had nine turnovers in the game. The Dragons were down 28-0 at the half.

The Dragons scored 20 points in the third quarter to get back into the game. Running back J. R. Madden scored on runs of 25, 20 and 1 yard.

“We’ll just have to learn from this,” Wilson said. “You can’t turn the ball over that many times and expect to win football games.”

Scott Moore

366-3535

sports@normantranscript.com

        

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