Tornado surges past Abingdon
Richlands (56) vs. Abingdon (21)
Written: Oct 23, 2015
By MIKE DAVIS
for the Daily Telegraph
RICHLANDS, Va. — In a winner-take-all rivalry class in the Southwest District, the Richlands Blue Tornado and Abingdon Falcons met Friday night at Ernie Hicks Stadi-um/ Emats Field.
Richlands scored 29 points in the third quarter to break an otherwise close game open on their way to a 56-21 win.
Nick Blankenship led the Tornado ground attack with a school-record 335 yards on 26 carries for three touchdowns and John-Luke Asbury threw for 220 yards completing 16-of-25 passes with an interception and five touchdown passes.
“I thought our special teams did a good job setting field position and sometimes that goes unnoticed,” Richlands head coach Greg Mance said. “I didn’t want people think we wanted to run the score up, but, we wanted 35 points (in the second half) to start the rolling clock. Abingdon is so explosive, they can score in a hurry.”
“I thought John-Luke (Absury) was on point and Nick Blankenship did a great job and when you have that, you have to take a look at our offensive line and we’re thankful to get out of here with the win.”
Richlands scored first with 3:32 showing on the first quarter clock answering a goal line stand by the Tornado defense on the other end of the field. Abingdon had driven inside the 10-yard line and Richlands had turned them away with a field goal attempt which went wide right.
The Blue Tornado marched 80 yards in less than three minutes and scored from the Falcon 20-yard line when Asbury found Chace Collins open for a catch and run and Nick Barrett answered the call with the point after.
Richlands scored again less than a minute into the second quarter when Asbury faked a handoff to Blankenhip, pump faked and threw long to Scottie Ball down the left sideline for a 34-yard touchdown. The extra point put the Blues ahead, 14-0.
Following an Abingdon punt, the Tornado was helped along in their next scoring drive by a facemask penalty which kept the series alive. Richlands scored in six plays capped by an inside slant to Howie from Asbury.
Abingdon came back with a fury mixing their plays, throwing sharp sideline passes from Sturgill to Chris DeSalvo and Derrick Yates with Matthew Fulton and Jeff Wallace added into the mix.
The Falcons went 75 yards in less than two minutes and scored on a 1-yard run by Sturgill.
Then, the Abingdon defense got into the act and picked off a Richlands pass at the Tornado 43-yard line giving the Falcons excellent field position. It took seven plays for Abingdon to cash in their gift and Sturgill did the honors with another 1-yard run.
From there, the gloves came off and the Tornado executed a 64-yard, 13-play drive and scored on a 10-yard pass from Asbury to Atkinson. Richlands missed the point after following a 15-yard penalty that backed the attempt to the 18-yard line on a dead-ball foul.
However, the missed extra point proved moot after the Blues came out with the opening possession of the second half and scored on a 64-yard drive that culminated with a 7-yard run by Blankenship.
Abingdon had a spark on their next possession when Yates found a seam in the Tornado defense after a Sturgill pass and turned on the burners for a 45-yard touchdown and James Dick added his third extra point of the night for the Falcons.
Richlands came back and extinguished the flash with a 48-yard touchdown from Asbury to Howie and two scoring runs by Blankenship that went for 34 and 97 yards.
The second touchdown set a second school record for longest touchdown run that had stood since 1972.
“They (Richlands) executed and we didn’t,” Abingdon head coach Darren Reed said. “I didn’t have our kids ready to play and that’s on me. Well get back to the drawing board that we’ll get corrected.”
Sturgill ended the game completing 26-of-42 attempts for 245 yards with an interception and a touchdown. Yates caught six passes for 101 yards and DeSalvo caught seven balls for 59 yards.
Howie led Richlands in receptions with seven catches for 120 yards and Ball caught five passes for 73 yards.
Richlands travels to Lebanon next week and Abingdon plays host to Tazewell.
At Ernie Hicks Stadium
Abingdon..............0 14 7 0 — 21
Richlands..............7 20 29 0 — 56
First quarter
R – Collins 20 pass form Asbury (Barrett kick)
Second quarter
R – Ball 34 pass from Asbury (Barrett kick)
R – Howie 9 pass from Asbury (Barrett kick)
A – Sturgill 1 run (Dick kick)
A – Sturgill 1 run (Dick kick)
R – Atkinson 10 pass from Asbury (Barrett kick)
Third quarter
R – Blankenship 7 run (Barrett kick)
A – Yates 45 pass from Sturgill (Dick kick)
R – Howie 48 pass from Asbury (Barrett kick)
R – Blankenship 34 run (Barrett kick)
R – Blankenship 97 run (Ball pass from Asbury)
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