THE FLYOVER | Tatum, WO and Beckville all slip up; Troup whips Winona
For sure, Troup High School head football coach Sam Wells wishes that “1” in the loss column wasn’t there.
The Tigers would love a mulligan, a do-over, if you will, to be able to re-play that game at Tatum a few weeks ago. But that’s not how football works. That’s not how sports work.
But there is this benefit: Wells and his Tigers can *sort of* fly under the radar a bit in UIL Class 3A, Division II. They were No. 1, and now the pressure is off a bit. Let people focus on Idalou, Newton, even Jefferson – maybe even West Rusk, who won at Arp on Friday night.
Troup can play sleight of hand, a shell game – don’t look at us. Look over there, see how good Poth is? See how good East Bernard is? And the whole time, flying low under that radar – here come the Tigers.
If that’s the case, then the people of Winona have a message for all of 3A, across Texas: Don’t forget about Troup.
Winona sure won’t.
The Tigers ran, well, anywhere they WANTED to run on Friday night at Winona, a 63-7 win. Troup is 5-1 overall, and is 1-0 in District 10-3A, Division II.
Oh, and Friday night: they’re hosting 5-1 Arp in one of the biggest games in the state.
Get this: at Winona, Troup led 56-0 AT THE HALF, and scored 35 points in the second quarter! Those are just stupid, ridiculous numbers.
And what of quarterback Trevor Golightly, missing some time earlier this year? Um, he’s back: 15-of-20 for 326 yards (!!) and FIVE touchdowns at Atlanta. Cameron Williams was on the receiving end of six of those passes for 165 yards (what?!) and three touchdowns.
Brett Wells ran for 119 yards and a touchdown on 12 carries. Heck, A.J. Dewberry scored the Tigers’ other rush TD.
Dewberry’s number: 66.
James Pierce had one of Golightly’s other TD passes – two catches for 57 yards and the score, and Logan Chambers caught one pass but made the most of it: a 20-yard touchdown.
Golightly hit seven different receivers in the contest, including four passes to his younger brother, Desh, for 68 yards.
Defensively, Bryson Needham and Mataes Lee each had seven tackles, and Lee had three for loss, as did Wells, and Dewberry had two. Troup as a defensive unit had 13 tackles for loss in that game.
Jaylen Anderson had a sack, Wells had two interceptions, Canyon Holland caused a Winona fumble and teammate Aidan Thibodeaux had a fumble recovery.
Atlanta 30, Tatum 15: The Atlanta Rabbits staged a full-on upset of Tatum on Friday night.
Atlanta, already with two losses this season and flying under the radar just a little bit themselves, would host a team that has been red-hot.
Coach Whitney Keeling and the Eagles had knocked off Troup, as mentioned above, when Troup was No. 1, and the only loss the Eagles had prior to their trip to Atlanta was by three points to a West Rusk program that Rafe Mata has playing great football right now.
But things just did not go Tatum’s way this past Friday.
Speedy, shifty Atlanta put 30 points on the board, and somehow held Tatum’s vaunted running game in check. And most of what the Rabbits (4-2) did was on the ground. Quarterback Brayden Thompson threw it 11 times but for just 32 yards, and a touchdown and an interception.
Durrel Soohl did his damage, though. Soohl carried the ball 13 times for 173 yards and scored twice. He also had two catches for 19 yards.
Atlanta finished with 283 rushing yards and three scores. Defensively for the Rabbits, Kameron Williams gave Tatum headaches. He had three sacks.
Now, Tatum shifts past that to the rest of its district schedule, specifically Gladewater. Tatum is 4-2 overall, and 0-1 in District 8-3A, Division I. Gladewater is 1-0 in district, having handled Sabine this past Thursday night. The Bears are 3-3 overall.
That game is at Gladewater on Friday, a 7 p.m. kickoff.
Liberty-Eylau 47, White Oak 6: Hopefully, the White Oak Roughnecks will go back to Texarkana at some point and have a better experience.
Because we don’t believe anyone was waving banners and throwing confetti after leaving Liberty-Eylau on Friday night.
White Oak has had a rough go of it this season, coach Tanner Thiel’s first in his return to White Oak as head football coach and athletic director. The Roughnecks are 0-6, now 0-1 in 8-3A, DI, and are giving up on average 43 ½ points per game. They’ve scored 100 points in those six games, so they’re averaging just over 16 a game.
The ‘Necks have Atlanta next, at White Oak on Friday night at 7 p.m.
Paul Pewitt 42, Beckville 26: Coach Cody Ross and the Beckville Bearcats were 2-0 in District 11-2A, Division I going to Omaha to face Pewitt, and left there Thursday night with a district loss – they’re now 3-4, and 2-1.
The loss snapped a two-game winning streak.
The Bearcats will host Harleton Friday night at 7 p.m.