WELCOME TO BLOWOUT CITY! | Arp, Troup, Beckville take care of business in district games

There were some pretty special performances this weekend — read more on that later today or in the morning on our Whataburger / ETBlitz.com Players of the Week story — and we haven’t even gotten to a few of them.

We’re about to do that right now.

Arp, Troup and Beckville all won by big margins, joining some of the other programs in the ETB coverage area as residents of Blowout City. Arp was at home and routed Buffalo; Troup ran Elkhart’s Elks back to the open range; and Beckville defeated Big Sandy so badly, it made Wildcats fans long for the good old days of the 1980s.

Arp 40, Buffalo 27: Zane Borque apparently stepped out onto the turf at Bill Herrington Stadium in Arp, looked at that new scoreboard, and decided, “You know what? Let’s see how well that thing works.”

And so he proceeded to go 6-of-7 for 133 yards and two touchdowns, and then ran for 106 yards and a score on 17 carries, leading the Tigers to a 40-27 win over Buffalo. Not the Bills; they were getting ready to play New England. Buffalo, the high school in East Texas, who did manage 27 points, but didn’t win the game.

Borque did throw an interception, but looked good, solid in the win.

Running back Josh Smith had a big game: he ran for 90 yards and two scores on just eight carries, and on defense, Smith had a sack and notched 13 tackles.

Catching passes were Wyatt Johnson, who had three catches for 99 yards and two scores; CP Pierce, who had two catches for 28 yards; and tight end Jaxon Schminkey, one catch for 6 yards.

The running game was working for Arp, too. The Tigers finished with exactly 250 yards on the ground. Borque had the 106 mentioned earlier, and Smith’s 90. Tanner Hunt added 49 on eight carries and Ty Langley had 5.

The Tigers are 5-1 overall and 1-1 in District 11-3A, Division II. They’ll take this weekend off, and then visit Elkhart (1-5, 0-2) on October 17.

Troup 67, Elkhart 2: Speaking of Elkhart, the Elks had a rough go of it at home against Troup Friday night.

Troup had scored 207 points this season coming into the game at Elkhart, and now the Tigers have 274 in six games.

And before we go any farther, their defense is on point, too: just 60 points allowed in those six, obviously an average of 10 points a game.

Brett Wells led a running game that’s just smashing folks. Wells ran for 156 yards and three touchdowns on 12 carries (13 yards a carry) and spearheaded the ground game, which finished the night with 297 yards. Aiden Thibideaux had 68 yards on nine carries; Dee Hollie had 49 and a touchdown on just two carries; and James Pierce ran for 24 yards, also on two carries.

Josh Childress is getting better and better at quarterback, if that’s possible. Childress, just a junior, is in his first year as a starter. He went 14-of-19 for 221 yards and three touchdowns, and did not throw a pick.

Hollie caught four balls for 27 yards. Cameron Hollie caught three for 39. Riley Blackmon caught two for 55; Wells, two for 42, and Pierce, two for 44.

Jackson Waller and Tanner Wilson each had six tackles. Mataes Lee, Billy Borja and Caden Starkey each had a tackle for loss. Lee had a sack. JJ Yanez had an interception, and Cameron Hollie caused a fumble.

Beckville 56, Big Sandy 0: The Beckville Bearcats flexed their muscles on both offense AND defense on Friday night, dropping 56 points on the Big Sandy Wildcats and holding them off the scoreboard completely.

In the process, some impressive numbers: Braxton Bullock didn’t miss a pass, which means his receivers didn’t drop one, either. Bullock went 8-of-8 for 164 yards and four touchdown, one that Jordan Mojica took 80 yards. Gabe Johnson scored twice, one of them a 5-yarder and the other, 47.

Jorden Pierce, who has had a bit of the national spotlight, had 164 yards rushing and scored twice on 13 carries.

Rudy Watts had a 45-yard punt return for a score and had a 3-yard TD catch, and one of Prince’s touchdowns was from 73 yards out.

The Bearcats, coached by Cody Ross, are 3-3 on the season and will host Waskom this Friday at 7 p.m. Waskom was ranked fourth in the state in last week’s 3A-Division II poll. This week’s polls will hit later today.