By T. Scott Boatright
It almost felt like a running clock began even before the opening kickoff as Cedar Creek celebrated Homecoming Friday night by playing host to Tensas at Cougars Stadium.
Cedar Creek scored on its first two offensive plays from scrimmage with a pick six sandwiched in between as the Cougars roared to a 60-0 win over the Panthers in a contest where a running clock did start on the first play of the second quarter.
Cougars coach William Parkerson said the contest couldn’t have been scripted any better for the Cougars from start to finish.
“We needed that,” Parkerson said about the win that pushed his Cougars to 2-3 on the season. “We came out and played someone who wasn’t as good as us and dominated from the start.”
And in fact, Parkerson admitted his team had its first few plays scripted well before the game began, starting with a little trickeration.
Taking over at their own 45-yard line after recovering an onsides kick attempt by Tensas, Cedar Creek quarterback Ladd Thompson fired a quick button hook to James Myers in the right flat. But the Cougars had Noah Durrett trailing the play along the right sideline.
Luker immediately made a spin move and pitched the ball back to Myers, who grabbed the ball at the 40-yard line and hit the afterburners en route to a 55-yard touchdown that, after Gray Worthey’s two-point conversion run, put Cedar Creek up 8-0 only 20 seconds into the contest.,
“We had a few scripted early plays,” Parkerson said. “We put in that trick play to make a little run this week and threw it on the first play. We couldn’t have drawn it up any better.”
Tensas took over after the ensuing kickoff at its own 41-yard line and were hit with a holding call before quarterback Emajai Bethel lofted up a pass that Durrett jumped in front of and raced back 40 yards for a score that, after Worthy threw a halfback pass to Lawson Lillo for the two-point conversion, put the Cougars on top 16-0 only 55 seconds into the contest.
After forcing Tensas to a three-and-out — the Panthers were held without a first down throughout the contest to set a new Cedar Creek school record, breaking the previous mark of one set last year — the Cougars took advantage of a shanked 0-yard punt by Tensas to take over at the THS 12-yard line.
And on first down, Thompson handed the ball to Worthey, who battled up the middle for a 11-yard scoring scamper that following a two-point conversion run by Thompson pushed the Cougars’ advantage to 24-0 only 3:42 into the game.
The Cougars upped their lead to 32-0 at the 5:07 mark of the opening stanza on a 1-yard run by Lillo before Thompson pushed that advantage to 40-0 when he took the snap and ran a quick bootleg, looping right off tackle for a three-yard touchdown run followed by a two-point conversion run by James Myers with 1:59 left in the first quarter.
That running clock started on the first play of the second quarter after the Cougars scored on the final play of the initial stanza when Wyatt Gremillion scored his first career touchdown, fighting through several attempted tackles on a 14-yard touchdown run that after a two-point conversion run attempt failed put Cedar Creek up 46-0.
On their next offensive possession, the Cougars scored again as Worthey weaved his back and forth across the field on a 53-yard run that set up Myers seven-yard touchdown run followed by Lillo’s two-point conversion run that increased Cedar Creek’s lead to 54-0 with 5:28 left in the first half.
Cedar Creek’s final score came only 1:50 into the second half. The Cougars recovered a fumble on the kickoff to begin the third quarter to take over at the Tensas 26-yard line. Gremillion ran for 14 yards on the next play before Luker danced his way to paydirt on a six-yard quarterback keeper.
Worthey led the Cougars with 75 yards on three carries while Gremillion ran for 39 yards on four attempts and Blake Wade chipped in with 32 yards on five rushes.
Thompson and Durrett added 23 yards each with each carrying the ball twice. Thompson also completed all three of his attempted passes for 70 yards.
Parkerson was pleased it was the kind of game that let him empty his bench early and give his younger players some key playing time.
“It was good to get so many young guys some solid work,” Parkerson said. “Luker looked good at quarterback and did a good job of coming out and running the offense for the varsity team. You can see they executed, at least early. We got a little sloppy later on, but the young guys looked really good out there.”
The Cougars held the Panthers to -7 yards of total offense with Durrett leading the defense with five tackles.
Parkerson was also pleased to see his team unaffected by distractions that often surround Homecoming football teams and come out and put the Panthers away early.
“I was glad to see that,” Parkerson said of the focus his Cougars maintained during a Homecoming game. “I think it showed a lot of maturity that they came out and played focused for 48 minutes.
“Before the game I told them nobody is going to remember what they wore on Tuesday of Homecoming week, nobody’s going to remember the dance, but that they’ll always remember the game, so they needed to come out and take care of business and they did that.”
Next up for the Cougars is a road game at Lafayette Renaissance Charter Academy on Oct. 13.
