The Ropes Eagles played their homecoming game this past Friday against the Hale Center Owls where they picked up their second win of the season, winning the game 33-6.
The Eagles went into the game ready and had a total of 64 plays throughout the game and made each one count as the team had 145 passing yards and 177 rushing yards for the game.
The Ropes defense was on top of the game on their side as well as they only allowed 139 passing yards and were a brick wall as they only allowed nine rushing yards.
The first quarter was all Ropes as they had scored two touchdowns in the first quarter, the first coming from a four yard run from Hayden Torres and afterwards failed the two-point conversion. The second touchdown was from Benjamin Saldivar where his touchdown was also on the ground carrying the ball for a one-yard run and there after, the team missed the PAT.
The second quarter was the same for the Eagles as they had two more touchdowns in the quarter, first one coming from Saldivar again off of a one-yard run where the team again failed the two-point conversion. The second touchdown of the game came through the air as Colton Mortensen had a 16-yard reception from Kade Franklin where the team got their first twopoint conversion of the game making the score 26-0 at the half.
The Eagles controlled the first half well and had full control of the game throughout.
The second half, Hale Center was able to get on the board for their only touchdown of the night and failing the two-point conversion making the score 26-6 in the third quarter.
The Eagles wrapped up the game in the fourth quarter scoring off of another pass play from Franklin airing out the ball to Mortenson for a 17-yard touchdown and putting the game to rest with the final score being 33-6 and the Eagles getting out of their with their homecoming win.
The Eagle offense had total control of the game and led Hale Center in every category except for third down efficiency where they were out done by converting 2-10 times throughout the game while Hale Center was able to convert 5-13 times for the entirety of the game.
Franklin took care of the ball throughout the game by throwing 11 for 18 passing attempts for 145 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions for the game.
The leading rusher for the team was Bregg Feldman with 10 attempts on the game for 85 yards with his longest run of the game being a 37-yard gain, Saldivar went for eight attempts for 43 yards and two touchdowns on the night, Jacob Wyatt going for 12 attempts on the night with 40 yards, and Torres going three attempts with nine yards and one touchdown The leading receiver was Branson Beck who went for five receptions for 75 yards and his longest being 25-yard gain, Mortenson having three receptions for 37 yards and two touchdowns, Jace Adams had one reception for 13 yards, Kaden Riker had 1 reception as well for 11 yards and Branson Simental having a reception as well for nine yards.
Defensively it was a good effort from the whole team but it was Beck that led the team in tackles as he had six of them thoughout the game, but it felt throughout the game that the defense lived in the backfield as they had 11 sacks on the night and Beck had two interceptions for the team.
The team rallied to the ball every time the ball came out of the quarterbacks hands and sometimes the quarterback didn’t have time to get it out with how good the pass rush is from the Eagles. The defense also forced four fumbles throughout the game.
Although it was a good team win they had a lot of penalties throughout the game as they had accumulated 16 flags throughout the game with 123 yards lost because of it. Hale Center had five flags for a total of 23 yards lost.
The Ropes Eagles next game will be against Tahoka as they hope to ride their momentum into this next game. Tahoka will try to as well as they are coming off of a big win from Crosbyton winning the game 62-6.
It will be a highly competitive game as both teams are good and they have a lot on the line before district play starts in two weeks. The game will be at Tahoka as the game will start at 7 p.m.