Patriots park Princeton
Princeton (16) vs. Wheeling Park (52)
Written: Oct 23, 2015
By BRIAN WOODSON
Bluefield Daily Telegraph
PRINCETON — Lightning struck quick and often. MPrinceton head coach Wes Eddy had said prior to the Tigers’ game with Wheeling Park that his club couldn’t afford ‘lightning strikes’. They wanted to make the Patriots take extended drives to get on the scoreboard.
Wheeling Park had other plans.
“We talked about it all week, when you travel this far you want to try to get a fast start and not just kind of lumber and walk around for a little bit,” said Wheeling Park head coach Chris Daugherty, who’s Patriots defeated Princeton 52-16 on Friday night at Hunnicutt Stadium. “That is a good football team, they are 5-2 and beat a lot of teams so we didn’t want to fool around. We wanted to try to get the best start we could.”
How about an 86-yard touchdown on the first official play of the game after the game opened with one of 21 penalties combined for the two teams.
Athletic wide receiver Elijah Bell caught a screen pass from Cross Wilkinson and worked his way downfield, starting on the right sideline, moved his way across the field, and then cut back again, eventually winding up in the end zone for a score just 30 seconds into the game.
Charles Adams followed with the two-point conversion and the No. 5 Patriots (6-1-1) took an early 8-0 lead on the No. 10 Tigers (5-3).
“They have an embarrassment of riches over there,” Princeton head coach Wes Eddy said. “What are you going to do, give No. 4 (Bell) the ball, that is hard. They are a great team, great coaches, everything is great, good job...
“There is nothing to say negative about this, that is probably one of the better teams you are going to run into in the state this year, they are very good.”
Wheeling Park scored four more times on big plays, building a 24-3 lead at the break. Chase Gheen made a 32-yard field goal, and Clay McDonald picked off a Christian Shafer pass and dashed 42 yards for the score and a 17-0 advantage after one quarter.
Princeton, which has just 14 yards in the opening period, got on the board with a 42-yard field goal by Jacob Whittington. Wheeling Park scored again with 47 seconds left in the half on a 47-yard strike from Wilkinson to Harrison Hartong.
“We started well and then I felt like we fell asleep for a little bit,” Daugherty said. “I didn’t like that, but then we came back in the second half and jumped back out there again, that is what we talked about at halftime.”
Wilkinson, who is just a sophomore, was 10-for-13 for 244 yards and two touchdowns for the Patriots. Bell had four receptions for 121 yards, while Hartong caught three passes for 87 yards.
“Don’t turn the ball over, take care of the ball, I thought (Cross) did that and he is able to make some plays with his arm,” Daugherty said “He grows every week, we think as he grows we are going to grow.
“It kind of helps that we can spread the ball out and not just throw to one kid. Elijah made a couple of nice plays early, but then we got away from him and Harrison made some catches and our tight end made some catches.
“I think if we can do that it makes it pretty tough offensively with our big back in the back too, you have got to tackle him.”
Princeton, which had just 90 yards at the break, finally got loose on the first drive of the third period, with Jordan Jones following a 29-yard run by Kevin Phillips by sprinting 50 yards to the end zone to narrow the margin to 24-10.
The Tigers got the ball back following a punt and Jones ran for 31 yards to put Princeton at the Wheeling Park 27-yard line. That was followed by two false start calls, and the drive stalled when Austin Curnes sacking Shafer on a fourth down at the Patriots’ 32.
“I thought the next offensive series where we went down and scored was big,” Daugherty said. “I don’t know if it deflated them, but I think it kind of set the tone for us in the second half.”
Wheeling Park then went to 215-pound Savion Johnson, who followed a 16-yard pass from Wilkinson to Bell by running for 32 yards, and later scored from the 5 to build the lead back to three touchdowns.
Johnson had 117 yards in the game, with 62 of those coming after the break.
“I thought they were prepared offensively for what we do in the running game and then we had to go to the air a little bit and try to free things up,” Daugherty said. “Then we were able to do that a little bit later in the game.”
Johnson scored again on a 3-yard run early in the fourth quarter, and the Patriots got two more touchdowns on punt returns from 45 and 51 yards by James Coles.
“He is explosive, we didn’t use him offensively tonight, but you can see he has the ability offensively too if we can get the ball in his hands,” Daugherty said. “He is like an offense in himself. He has returned a lot of punts. I would be shocked if anyone has more punt returns for touchdowns than him, that may have been his fourth or fifth one this year.
“It is nice when you have a kid like that who can make some plays.”
Princeton finished the scoring on a 7-yard run by Je’Nye Hearn with 1:48 left in the game.
“We have good kids, they don’t quit,” Eddy said. “We didn’t quit anytime during the night, we fought to the very end.”
Eddy was his usual positive self with the team after the game.
“What is there negative to say, you played a great team, what are you going to do, pout or whine about it, no, you don’t do that,” said Eddy, who’s Tigers had won four straight games, all on the road. “There are weaknesses that get exploited in this and now we can go back and see where we are weak and we will make corrections on those and try to get it back together again.”
Up next is a visit on Friday to Greenbrier East, the second of three ranked Class AAA teams that Princeton will play to finish the regular season.
“We will go in there, turn the videos on and get ready,” he said.
at Hunnicutt Stadium
Wheeling Park...................17 7 7 21 — 52
Princeton............................0 3 7 6 — 16
Scoring
First Quarter
WP—Elijah Bell 86 pass from Cross Wilkinson (Chase Gheen kick) 11:30
WP—Gheen 32 field goal 4:17
WP—Clay McDonald 42 interception return (Gheen kick) :02.5
Second Quarter
PR—Jacob Whittington 42 field goal 7:43
WP—Harrison Hartong 47 pass from Wilkinson (Gheen kick) :47
Third Quarter
PR—Jordan Jones 50 run (Whittington kick) 10:24
WP—Savion Johnson 5 run (Gheen kick) 5:07
Fourth Quarter
WP—Johnson 3 run (Gheen kick) 11:06
WP—James Coles 45 punt return (Gheen kick) 9:22
WP—Coles 51 punt return (Gheen kick) 7:48
PR—Je’Nye Hearn 7 run (run failed) 1:48
• • •
TEAM STATISTICS
First downs: WP 13; PR 13. Rush-Yards: WP 30-165; PR 49-282. Pass Yards: WP 244; PR 13. Total Yards: WP 409; PR 295. Comp-Att-Int: PR 10-13-0; PR 3-10-1. Fumbles-Lost: WP 3-1; PR 1-0. Penalty-Yards: WP 13-107; PR 8-65. Punts-Avg: WP 2-36.0; PR 6-29.5.
• • •
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
Rushing: WP Savion Johnson 17-117, Nathan Phillips 2-22, Jacob Laing 3-18, Charles Adams 1-10, Christian Tripp 2-7, Zach Torbett 1-2, Cross Wilkinson 4-(-11). PR Jordan Jones 10-108, Kevin Phillips 9-67, Zach Standifur 15-30, Je’Nye Hearn 5-32, Jaden Thorn 3-30, Jayden Hearn 1-10, Christian Shafer 3-3, Josh Craighead 1-1, Jared Hamm 2-(-1).
Passing: WP Wilkinson 13-10-0 int-244-2 td; PR Shafer 3-10-1 int-13-0 td.
Receiving: WP Elijah Bell 4-121, Harrison Hartong 3-87, Isaac Turner 3-36; PR Jones 1-7, Tyler Whitt 1-4, Phillips 1-2.
Turnovers: WP Clay McDonald int; PR Phillips fr.
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