Bulldogs show their teeth against Longhorns
Published 1:07 am Saturday, September 28, 2019
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Star Photo/Ivan Sanders A group of Hampton Bulldog defenders stop a run by the Longhorns.
Star Photo/Brandon Hyde Hampton's Aiden Vines attempts to pass a Longhorn defensive back to reach the endzone.
BY NIC MILLER
STAR CORRESPONDENT
Hampton- JC Campbell Stadium was rocking Friday night as the Hampton Bulldogs took on the Longhorns of Johnson County in a matchup between two teams with even records.
With the conclusion of the national anthem, the stage was set and the contest got underway.
Not much happened for the first eleven minutes of play as it seemed as if this game was going to be a stalemate. The Longhorns were able to get a drive going late in the quarter until Max Cash would force a fumble giving Hampton the ball in the red zone to start the second quarter.
The second quarter started with a bang as the Bulldogs Macon Barden would run 14 yards to score a touchdown that was followed by a jump pass from Caleb Oaks to Matt Hughes to tack on two more points making it 8-0 in favor of Hampton.
Showing that they were not going to go away easily, the Longhorns Curtis Lowe would bring the ball up close to midfield on a 20-yard run. But soon after, Hayden Birchfield made a key stop giving his team the ball once more.
Barden would find a hole once more on the new drive busting a rush up the middle for 58 yards just outside the 10-yard line.
Aiden Vines would follow the play with a rush of his own that would put his team on the board once again from three yards to make it a 14-0 contest.
The excitement would continue when the Bulldogs performed a successful onside kick giving them the ball in enemy territory.
It wasn’t long after when Oaks recorded a touchdown of his own scoring from 22-yards on a completion from his quarterback Connor Jones. The conversion was good, giving Hampton a 22-point edge.
After a holding penalty brought back a touchdown, Vines would score for the second time from 20-yards out and with the addition of the two-point conversion, Hampton was not looking back as they had a comfortable 30-0 lead.
And if things couldn’t get any better for Hampton, Birchfield would come up big on defense once again intercepting Longhorn quarterback Stacy Greer for a 25-yard return followed by a 28-yard run to the outside by Isiah Greenwell for yet another Bulldog touchdown.
With the extra point, the score was now 37-0 before the halftime break.
Along with the rain that had been falling for a while came lightning which would lead to a delay in a game that had not even reached halftime yet.
After around an hour’s delay, things were back underway. But with such little time left in the half, there was not much excitement left leading up to the break.
With the ball being slippery from the rain that had been falling the Bulldogs took over after a fumble on the kickoff. But it was nothing doing as possession changed hands many times in the quarter.
To start the fourth quarter the Longhorns were able to eventually score with a four-yard TD run by Lowe in a time where it seemed to be too late. After adding a two-point conversion, the score was now 37-8.
With three minutes left in the game, Jones hit Gage Chambers from four yards out to bring back the running clock as the Bulldogs would cap the game off with a score of 44-8.
After a big win for his team head coach Michael Lunsford said, “We’ve just been a different team since we lost to Happy Valley. We’ve been a whole lot more focused and a lot more disciplined and I’m proud of what our guys did out there tonight.”
On his team scoring 37 points in one quarter, Lunsford said, “You can’t do that without executing in all three phases of the game. Our defense had a lot of turnovers that led to scores, we got that onside kick that set us up, and our running game was phenomenal.”
The Bulldogs will be back in action next Friday at Sullivan North to take on the Raiders.
