BUCKEYES IN A BLOWOUT | McCown tosses 4 TDs, as Gilmer soars by Spring Hill, 59-28
By PHILLIP WILLIAMS
Exclusive to ETBLITZ.COM
GILMER – ‘Twas the night of McCown the Magnificent.
Gilmer Buckeyes quarterback Brady McCown flung four TDs as ninth-ranked and defending state sultan Gilmer stultified the Spring Hill Panthers, 59-28, in a District 7 4-A Division II dustup Friday night at Jeff Traylor Stadium.
The contest featured a lollapalooza of long-distance TDs from both teams, who combined for 13 touchdowns as the free-bleeding defenses encountered an Ode to Offense. Gilmer toted up a 27-6 advantage, saw it clipped to 27-14, and then lunged ahead 33-14 at Twirling Time to somewhat inter the Panthers by then.
McCown had co-stars in his finest performance since transferring to Gilmer from Jacksonville this season. Trillyon Butler, Brendan Webb and Solomon Jackson took bows on Gilmer High’s “Senior Night” by procuring a pair of TDs apiece.
Thus did Gilmer (6-3, 3-1) rebound like a basketball from its somewhat stupefying 27-10 pratfall against Pleasant Grove the prior week. The visitors meantime skidded to 2-7 overall, 1-3 in district disputations.
Gilmer bids adieu to the regular season at 7 p.m. Friday in Paris against hapless North Lamar before beginning the Buckeyes’ perennial path in Playoff Paradise.
Spring Hill’s landlubbing offense, which threw only a handful of passes all evening Friday, had substantial success in its ground game, especially in the first half, but the Buckeyes eventually pretty much squelched it except for a pair of too-little-too-late TDs.
Meantime, the Panther pass defense proved as helpless before the onslaught of McCown and his Venus-Fly-Trap fingered receivers as Hiroshima and Nagasaki were against The Bomb.
The scorekeeper, who reportedly requested a bonus for having to post 13 touchdowns during the evening. didn’t even have time to spill his coffee before Gilmer procured the game’s first scoring salvo.
After Spring Hill opened the proceedings with an unsuccessful onside kick, Gilmer went to TD Town on the game’s first play from scrimmage when Butler whizzed 54 yards around left end. Normally reliable kicker Brayden Pate missed the PAT, leaving Gilmer up 6-0 with 11:47 left in the inaugural chapter.
Spring Hill, by contrast, plodded to its first TD on the ensuing possession, taking 13 rushing plays (including a fourth down conversion) to inch 88 yards and reach Beulah Land when Joseph Ventura shot 13 yards around left end.
On what wasn’t the most felicitous of Fridays for kickers, Panther Brady Meyer emulated Pate in misfiring on the PAT with 5:56 remaining in the first quarter, leaving it 6-6.
Gilmer’s Rapid Response squad came to the fore, though, taking only five plays to motor 55 yards to TD territory after recovering another Panther onside kick. This would open a blitzkrieg of Buckeye Big Bangs which would leave Spring Hill in a 21-point ditch before the Panthers could score again.
McCown began his aerial artistry with a 39-yard bomb to Cadon Tennison, the starting quarterback on last year’s state champion team, and who was more wide open than some “speakeasy” saloons probably were during Prohibition. Pate airlifted the first of three consecutive successful PATs with 4:03 still left in quarter one.
Confounded by penalties on their next possession, the Panthers punted a mere 33 yards to their own 45, but eventually halted Gilmer on downs at the visitors’ 4. Spring Hill continued grinding Gilmer on the ground, inching all the way to the hosts’ 13 before Quinton Cutler disgorged a fumble to the Buckeyes at the 14.
After trooping for a 3-yard gain, McCown fired a quick out pass to the right to Webb, who would transform the play into a dumbfounding 83-yard TD toss in which he broke one would-be tackle well downfield before stiff-arming another Panther.
This came with 6:20 left to Trumpet Time and the Gilmer Glory was far from finished.
The Panthers, who actually drew a penalty on their next possession for having a player participate in a play without wearing a helmet, punted only 15 yards to their own 30, allowing Gilmer to soon swoop to another score. That would start a scoring splurge in which the two teams combined for a rapid-fire three TDs in only 59 seconds of playing time.
On the third play after the poor punt, Webb wheeled 24 yards around the left side and Pate’s kick made it 27-6 with 3:10 left to intermission.
Just when it appeared, though, that Gilmer might be on its way to a total route “right quick,” the Panthers hit a haymaker. Immediately after SH fair-caught the kickoff, giving it possession at its 25, Trevor Allen abruptly thundered 75 yards to tally before QB Travis Allen flung a two-point pass to Levi Mackey with 2:57 remaining.
Suddenly, it was 27-14 and the visitors seemed back in contention–but not for long.
After Gilmer recovered yet another onside kick at its 49, the hosts needed only three McCown completions to produce points again as he air mailed a 16-yard scoring sling to Zade Taylor with 2:11 to go to Music Time.
Alec Sims’ run for two points failed, but the Buckeyes delivered a 19-point lead to the dressing room before the drill teams and bands mercifully provided the scorekeeper some relief.
Although Spring Hill would total two more TDs afterward, things would nonetheless worsen for the Panthers altogether.
Starting fairly fast.
SH took the kickoff and went 3-and-out before punting–50 yards this time–to the hosts’ 19. On the eighth play afterward, Butler bopped a yard for a TD with 8:44 left in the third before Pate again uncharacteristically misfired. (He’d make the next two PATs, though, before backup left-footed kicker Celson James missed the one after Gilmer’s final TD).
With Gilmer up 39-14, the teams exchanged punts–the Buckeyes’ first of the night came with about five and a half minutes left in the third quarter–before the hosts awoke the scorekeeper. That came after the teams combined for three punts on three straight possessions.
Gilmer returned the last of those kicks to the Spring Hill 48, and promptly gained 15 yards on a Panther penalty. On the third play afterward, Jackson screamed 20 yards to the left for the TD with 2:26 left in the third.
Now somewhat hopelessly down 46-14, the Panthers gamely displayed they had not struck their tents as, right after they took the ensuing kickoff, Trevor Allen duplicated his earlier 75-yard TD trip with 2:12 left in the third. Meyer airlifted the first of two successful PATs.
Gilmer, however, again hit the rapid response button, promptly hiking 70 yards in six plays to produce points on McCown’s 23-yard quick out to the right to Trace Haynes. That came with 37 seconds left in the third.
In the fourth quarter, the Panther offense was snuffed on downs at the Gilmer 30, and the Buckeyes immediately threw another Sunday Punch (albeit on a Friday night). Jackson went to his left 70 yards to Touchdown Town with 8:18 left.
Spring Hill continued to throw some successful shots, though, trekking 75 yards in 11 rushing plays after the ensuing kickoff for the game’s final TD on Ventura’s 3-yard hop to the right with 2:40 remaining.
About all that accomplished was to tax the scorekeeper’s energy yet a little further.
Thus, unlike the Pink Panther inspector who in the long-ago movies somehow bungled his way to investigative success, on this night, the Spring Hill Panthers found the Gilmer Buckeyes to be a case they couldn’t solve.