Pulaski County falls to Titans in district opener

By DOUG EADS, CJ Sports Writer
Commonwealth Journal

Harrodsburg September 06, 2008 09:52 pm

— Most football coaches will tell you that a football team will make its biggest improvement from week one in a season to week two.
If that’s indeed the case, then Pulaski County head football coach Johnny Hines certainly has his work cut out for him in 2008.
Sure, there were three starters in street clothes on Friday night, including starting quarterback and All-State candidate Chris Muse, and thanks to that fact, Mercer County certainly took advantage.
The Titans rolled up 355 yards of total offense in this game, while holding PC to just 149 yards in total offense, in an impressive, 38-7 Mercer County victory which dropped PC to 0-2 on the young season, and to 0-1 in district play.
“They (Mercer County) showed what an outstanding team they are,” stated Hines immediately following the contest.
“They’re big and strong up front offensively, and they’ve got some really big backs that run hard and they just wore us down tonight,” added the PC head coach. “I thought defensively we stayed in the game for three quarters, but we were just on the field too long. Offensively, we struggled to put together some drives, and that hurt us defensively.”
Indeed, without Muse in the lineup, and with sophomore quarterback Zach Eastham making his first varsity start, and with starting wide receiver Brian Barnett out with a broken foot as well, the PC offense struggled mightily early on in this district clash.
The Maroons had only 10 offensive plays from scrimmage in the opening half of play, for a minuscule 8 yards, compared to Mercer County who was moving the football up and down the field seemingly with ease.
Compounding matters for PC, is the fact that Hines and crew got a big-time stop on Mercer’s first drive of the contest, but like much of the season has gone thus far for the maroon and white, Pulaski was snake-bitten on a bad break.
With Mercer County deep inside Pulaski County’s territory, the Maroons came up with an interception, but a penalty nullified the turnover, and Mercer County would score on a 1-yard plunge by Jordan Yeast, taking a 7-0 lead over PC with 6:55 remaining in the opening quarter of play.
“That play hurt, but it hurt earlier too, when down on one end they fumbled when Yeast, I think carried the ball and fumbled it into the end zone,” stated Hines. “That’s a turnover for us, and they (officials) ruled that he had stepped out of bounds before he fumbled it into the end zone.”
“From upstairs, our eyes in the sky thought that it was a poor call, but you can’t blame officials because they do the best that they can and they do a good job,” added the Maroon coach. “They’re not the reason why we win or lose football games.”
A Kyle Chadwick 26-yard field goal in the second stanza gave the Titans a 10-0 advantage at the intermission, and as bad as things had gone offensively for PC in the first half, the Maroons were still in this one at the break, only trailing the Titans by two scores.
But, things wouldn’t stay that way for long.
Mercer County eased the lead out to 24-0 at the end of the third period, on a 4-yard TD run by Matthew McCloud, and on a 42-yard interception return late in the frame by the Titans Tyler Horn.
With a 24-0 cushion headed into the fourth quarter of play, Mercer County had this one all but wrapped up.
“It helped us a lot tonight with their quarterback (Muse) not being in there, but they’re backup (Zach Eastham) is pretty good though, I can tell you that,” stated Mercer County head coach Marty Jaggers.
“He’s not bad at all, but that (Chris) Muse kid is pretty good, because he beat us last year in this game,” continued the Titans coach. “He made a play against us last year that was just incredible.”
Shutout for the first three quarters, senior Winston Hines finally put his team on the scoreboard with 9:35 remaining in the contest, on an 18-yard scamper, cutting the deficit to 31-7.
However, just 1:10 later, Mercer County’s Russell Mays raced into the end zone on a 51-yard scoring run, rounding out the scoring and an impressive, 38-7 Mercer County win.
“We’ve just got a pretty shaken football team right now that’s battling the injury bug and the sick bug right now,” said Hines. “We had several guys just plain ole sick tonight, but played with a lot of guts out there, but just didn’t feel good.”
Off to an 0-2 start with a football team that most thought would win eight, nine, or possibly all 10 of its regular season games this year, Pulaski County will now set its sight on the Russell County Lakers next week in the Maroons home opener — a game that PC would certainly like to win, especially with the way things have gone over the course of the first two weeks of the season.
Now, while Russell County is no longer a district game for the Maroons, and while it’s not a must win by any means, the PC head coach says that what will be a must next week, is for his club to play much, much better than it has in the first two weeks of the 2008 season, especially when it has the football.
“It’s not critical obviously, but I do think it’s critical that we play better offensively against Russell County,” Hines said.
“Right now, we’re not blocking people very well, we’re not blocking people on the perimeter very well, and we’re not pass protecting very well,” pointed out the PC coach. “We’re just not executing things very well at all right now, and it’s very, very frustrating. We’ll go back to the drawing board this next week and try to get better.”

PC—0 0 0 7—7
MC—7 3 14 7—38

MC—Yeast 1 run (Chadwick kick)
MC—FG Chadwick 26
MC—McCloud 4 run (Chadwick kick)
MC— Horn 42 Int. Ret. (Chadwick kick)
MC—Yeast 24 run (Chadwick kick)
PC—Hines 18 run (Lester kick)
MC—Mays 51 run (Chadwick kick)

RUSHING—PC, Abner 8-67, Hines 12-49. MC, Yeast 18-117, Mays 5-64, McCloud 4-42.
PASSING—PC, Eastham 6-16 41 2. MC, Dunn, 2-6 33 1, Short 2-4 19.
RECEIVING—PC, White 3-36, Hines 3-5. MC, Linton 2-40, Horn 1-10, McCloud 1-2.

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