Photo by Tom Dendy
Trayse Holmes fights for yardage.
The start of a new football season brings new hope to a team and its fans.
"This is the year."
"We're gonna win district."
"We're gonna keep playing when December rolls around."
"State bound!"
Well... the start of football season has proven to be rather unkind to the Cypress Woods Wildcats as they started off 2019 with a 31-14 loss to the Cypress Ridge Rams. This is the sixth straight year that they've lost the season opener; their last win came in 2013 when they blanked Klein Collins 21-0.
Yes, first game and whatnot. Really though, it would be nice to start off a season on a winning note for a change.
Special teams proved to be quite the adventure for Woods on Thursday. There was a seven-yard punt, a bad snap on another punt that allowed the Rams to start a drive at the Woods one-yard line instead of falling on the ball in the endzone for a safety, another punt where a Woods player ran towards a bouncing ball after everyone else heeded the warning to get away from it, and a muffed punt that the Rams recovered in the red zone which they converted into a touchdown. We saw it in the playoffs last year... if one phase of the game falters, it's tough for the other two phases to make up the difference.
The Rams threw three quarterbacks at the Wildcat defense; all three of them brought that dual-threat capability and all of them found a way to gash the Cats on the ground; Le'juene Patterson, who started the evening as a wide receiver, scored twice. Jaelon Madden also had a rushing touchdown. Isaiah Phillips managed to gain 54 yards on his six carries.
The tandem of Leslie Wellington and Tristian Fletcher wore the Cats down and Mark Benjamin delivered a haymaker out of nowhere with his 54-yard touchdown run. The Rams simply won the battle in the trenches. Ridge consistently winning at the line of scrimmage can largely be attributed to one Vernon Broughton, who spent the evening terrorizing the Wildcat offensive line. He only had three tackles but he was effective in disrupting the Cats' offense, especially in the running game, and that allowed guys like Daniel Zarate, Ja'Nyus Morgan, and Centarus Smith to make some plays themselves.
What Happened
It started out encouragingly enough. The Wildcat defense forced a turnover on downs in their first appearance of 2019 and gave the offense the ball inside the Rams' 35. Tre Mejía scored the first points of the season when he scored on a 13-yard pass from Jackson Jones. Unfortunately, on their next drive, Ridge marched 96 yards to tie the game and Jaelon Madden capped it off with a 16-yard touchdown run.
End of 1st Quarter: Woods 7, Ridge 7
The Cats were forced to punt midway through the second quarter and the Rams wasted little time on their next drive as Mark Benjamin scored on a 54-yard run on the very next play. Miguel Moreno added to Ridge's lead with a 33-yard field goal as time expired in the first half.
Halftime: Ridge 17, Woods 7
The Wildcat offense went three-and-out to start the second half and then when they lined up to punt, the snap sailed over Michael Fernandez's head and instead of taking a safety, he fell on the loose ball at the one-yard line. The Rams gladly accepted the gift in the form of a one-yard touchdown run by Le'juene Patterson. Christian Scott answered with a four-yard touchdown run near the end of the third quarter.
End of 3rd Quarter: Ridge 24, Woods 14
The Rams recovered a muffed punt in the red zone about midway through the fourth quarter and Patterson capped off the scoring with a five-yard run on a keeper.
Final: Ridge 31, Woods 14
Ground
The Wildcats only had 59 rushing yards, but they lost 32 of those on a bad snap as they were trying to punt. Amazingly, again, instead of taking the safety, Michael Fernandez fell on the ball at the one-yard line. Hopefully he'll learn from that and just give the other team the two points the next time he's in that situation.
Other than that, Trayse Holmes had a couple of decent runs but no one could break out for a big gain. Christian Scott found the end zone late in the third quarter, so there's that.
All statistics from Varsity Wires.
Trayse Holmes: 13 rush, 54 yards
Christian Scott: 6 rush, 25 yards, TD
Victor Benavides: 1 rush, 9 yards
Konner Sabrsula: 1 rush, 8 yards
JaVarian Stewart: 1 rush, 6 yards
Jackson Jones: 7 rush, -2 yards
Tre Mejía: 2 rush, -9 yards
Air
Jackson Jones found himself under pressure for much of the game and it was clear that the timing between him and his receivers wasn't quite there. Cam Sowell was inactive for this game so his presence was sorely missed. The first touchdown of the season came through the air as he found Tre Mejía in the first quarter. JaVarian Stewart's 24-yard catch late in the fourth quarter ended up being the Wildcats' longest play from scrimmage in this game.
Jackson Jones: 11-25, 117 yards, TD; sacked three times
Dylan Cormier: 1-4, 24 yards
Tre Mejía: 4 catches, 45 yards, TD
Christian Scott: 4 catches, 39 yards
Ryan Faulk: 2 catches, 28 yards
JaVarian Stewart: 1 catch, 24 yards
Trayse Holmes: 1 catch, 5 yards
Defense
Honestly, I didn't think that the defense played terribly, but they were certainly forced into some undesirable positions because of the aforementioned special teams mishaps. Eventually, the Rams' linemen would take over this game and the Cats' lack of discipline in defending the zone read doomed them in this game. I can't remember seeing the man responsible for outside containment getting fooled every. single. time.
Twenty Wildcats recorded at least one tackle and Colton Morris led the way with eleven. 2.5 of his tackles resulted in a loss of yards. It was a busy night for the second level of the defense as Tylan Foster racked up eight and Riley Redgrave had six. Taber Tofte and Chase Richter had five apiece. Kahlil Robinson broke up a couple of passes.
Special Teams
Special teams ended up being the culprit in Woods' playoff loss; it could definitely be argued that it played a role in this loss. Again, it's the first game, but that was particularly disconcerting to see.
Michael Fernandez hit both of his extra points, so he's got the placekicking part down pat. Punting... well, there's plenty of time and room for improvement.
Michael Fernandez: 2-2 XP; 5 punts, 119 yards (23.4 yards per punt), longest punt 34 yards
Christian Scott: 3 kicks returned, 51 yards, longest return 23 yards
Chase Richter: 2 punts returned, 14 yards, longest return 9 yards; one muffed punt
Man of the Match
Colton Morris and Ty Foster definitely stood out on the defensive side of the ball. They were involved in virtually every play defensively; Ty had a particularly impressive open-field tackle in the second quarter.
Sub-Varsity Results
Freshman Cardinal 43 (1-0), Cy Ridge Freshmen 0
Freshman Gold @ Westfield canceled
JV Cardinal 31 (1-0), Cy Ridge JV 2
JV Gold vs. Klein Cain canceled, Woods JV teams played as one team against Ridge
Looking Ahead
The Wildcats will return to Pridgeon Stadium to take on the Spring Lions on Saturday, September 7. Kickoff is at 6:00.
