RANGERS’ FOCUS TURNS TO BUCS | KC’s homecoming Saturday vs. Blinn

If there’s anything of which Kilgore College football fans are guilty, it’s being spoiled.

That’s right: Kilgore College football has spoiled its fans the last, oh, nine or 10 years, especially, really the last 20, under three different head coaches: Jimmy Rieves and then J.J. Eckert, who both won big here, each winning conference titles, and now under Willie Gooden, who has taken it to another level with back-to-back conference championships and an appearance in the NJCAA final four, the national semifinals, a year ago.

KC is 38-14 under Gooden, and had a 12-game regular winning streak over Tyler Junior College until last week. The Rangers have lost to TJC just twice since the start of the 2017 season.

Well, KC fans, they’re about to try to spoil you even more.

The last time the Kilgore College Rangers won three straight conference titles was in 1980, 1981 and 1982, and one of those seasons was a co-championship.

Gooden and the 2024 version of the Rangers don’t have “co-anything” on their minds.

A week after losing for the second time this season, though, and the Rangers have to be laser-focused Saturday at 3 p.m. on visiting Blinn, who at first look is a bit deceiving. The Buccaneers do have losses in the last month to both Trinity Valley and to Tyler, but both of those losses were 13-10 final scores – very close.

And Blinn (4-3 overall) does have a big conference win, a 44-43 win over Navarro, which played the Rangers closer than anyone else over the last two seasons when KC has been so dominant in the conference.

It’s homecoming Saturday at KC, and the homecoming pregame will begin at 2:30 p.m. at KC’s home, R.E. St. John Memorial Stadium in Kilgore.

For tickets, here’s your link: Kilgore College vs Blinn College | Kilgore College Box Office (hometownticketing.com).

To see the livestream of the game online, go to the KC YouTube channel right here: KC Football on youtube.com.

Back to football.

The Southwest Junior College Football Conference standings headed into Saturday’s games look like this: Tyler Junior College is at the top (oddly enough) at 6-0 in conference play. KC is actually two games back, at 3-2, and Navarro is also at 3-2, although KC would win a tiebreaker in the event they remain tied, due to the Rangers winning the head-to-head matchup in Corsicana.

Cisco College, who beat KC in September, is in fourth right now at 3-3, and the conference playoffs – which begin Nov. 16 – only take the top four.

Blinn is on the outside looking in at 2-3. But with an upset of KC on Saturday, and a win at home over Cisco next week, Blinn could get in, at that No. 4 spot, or even No. 3, since the Bucs beat Navarro.

KC can shut all of that down, in all likelihood, with a win over Blinn on Saturday.

The Bucs come in averaging 32.3 points and 421 yards per game, and their running game is really going: 256 rushing yards a game.

Blinn’s defense has been good at slowing the run of its opponents: they’re allowing only 123 rush yards a game, to go with giving up just 15.7 points a game.

Kelton Weathers leads the Bucs in rush yards – 510 – and on 74 carries, so he’s averaging 6.9 yards a carry. But Weathers hasn’t scored all season. Three players – Rylan Wooten, Martavious Boswell and Jalen Washington – have the bulk of Blinn’s rushing touchdowns: Wooten and Washington each have four, and Boswell has five.

Wooten is the quarterback for Blinn, and he’s completed 73-of-130 passes for 908 yards, seven touchdowns and just one interception all season.

His main targets are Nathan Lewis (15 catches, 254 yards and a touchdown), Austin Abram III (21 catches, 182 yards, two scores), and Rae’G Dailey (10 catches, 117 yards, and five TDs).

The Bucs have a weapon at punter in Breck Chambers, who averages just over 45 yards a punt, has a 62-yarder to his credit this season, and landed four inside the 20-yard-line.

Kicker Max Nowak is 12-of-14 in extra points this season; Cameron Noto is 14-of-14; and Nowak has five field goals.

Defensive back Ifeanyi Ohalete, a former Lake Travis standout, leads the Bucs in tackles with 51. Jequarrius McClendon, a sophomore defensive lineman from Killeen, leads in sacks (six – the Bucs have 21 sacks on the season). Sophomore defensive end Justin Garza, a Blinn hometowner from Brenham, leads the team in tackles for loss (15). And Blinn has seven interceptions, but no player has more than one.

Now, to coach Gooden’s Rangers, who, by the way, have won six in a row in the series, including a 38-28 win at Brenham a year ago. KC’s last loss to Blinn was actually at R.E. St. John, back on Sept. 23, 2017. Gooden has never lost to Blinn as a head coach.

The Rangers this season are scoring 31.7 points a game, allowing way less than Blinn on the ground (giving up just 49 yards rushing a game), and are averaging 330 yards of offense a game themselves. KC’s ‘D’ is giving up, on average, just 16.6 points a game.

Starting quarterback Tyler Webb, a sophomore from Waco Connally, is 81-of-150 for 1,036 yards this season, with eight touchdown passes and six interceptions. Seth Mouser of Bastrop and Jahrik Jones of Houston Summer Creek have both also had playing time: Mouser is 9-of-16 for 195 yards, three touchdowns and an interception, and Jones, 1-of-4 for 10 yards.

KC has ran for 1,073 yards as an offensive unit, with 13 touchdowns and a 5-yard-per-carry average. Sophomore running back Gary Maddox, a former Euless Trinity standout, has 319 yards and six touchdowns on 81 carries, and Luke McMullen of Jefferson, 205 yards and two scores on 32 carries. Webb, Jones, Tanner Harrison (of St. Martinville, La.), Samuel Mbake (Kennesaw, Ga.), and Kendal Taylor (Houston Westfield) all have one rush touchdown each this season.

Speaking of Mbake, the Georgia native has 17 catches for 233 yards and a score this year. Melvin Polk has 14 for 184 and a score, and Devontae Mozee, who came to KC from Hodge High School in Jonesboro, La., has 12 for 239 and three scores. Tight end Ashtin Watkins, from Tyler High, has two touchdowns on seven catches, and 150 yards this season.

Former Kilgore High School standout Adan Reyes and former Longview kicker Anthony Monsivais share the placekicking duties. Reyes has hit 10 of 13 field goals in 2024, a long of 43 yards, and is 24-of-26 in extra points. Monsivais has hit three of his four field goal attempts, a long of 40 yards, and is 5-of-5 in extra points.

Monsivais has booted most of the Rangers’ punts this year: 26 of them, for an average of 35.1 yards a kick, and landed 10 inside the 20. Webb is also a capable punter.

The Rangers have really shined in their return game this year. Mozee has seven returns for 297 yards, and averages 42.4 yards a return, with a touchdown. Polk has five kick returns and averages 31 yards a return, and has had four punt returns, including a 95-yard return for a touchdown against Navarro.

Former Jacksonville standout Jermaine Taylor and Marcus Moultrie (Killeen) each have a touchdown on kick returns, as well.

Now, let’s take a look at that defense.

Izeal Jones, a sophomore defensive lineman from Houston Pearland, is leading the Rangers in overall tackles (67), and also has 4 ½ tackles for loss, two forced fumbles and a fumble recovery.

Sophomore linebacker DaeVaughndric Lewis of Daingerfield, sophomore defensive lineman Christian Thomas (Port Arthur Memorial) and lineman Matt Freeman (Trinity Christian in Red Oak0 are leading the Rangers in sacks: Thomas has five, Lewis four, and Freeman, three for a defensive unit that really gets after the passer: 30 sacks this season.

The Rangers have 54 tackles for loss this year, led in that category by sophomore linebacker Josh Williams (Mesquite), and KC has nine interceptions this year, led by sophomore defensive back Jaylen Webb (Kennedale) with five. KC’s defensive secondary has 29 pass break-ups this year: Moultrie, and Anthony Rose (Miami, Fla.) each have four, and Williams, at linebacker, has four, as well.