Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First
Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First
Kimball School Activities Director Ken Smith added a new twist to last Friday night's Kimball versus Southwest football game with a tunnel walk, Longhorn Style. Younger kids were encouraged to dress in red and get in free so they could participate in the tunnel walk giving them the opportunity to "slap five" with the Longhorn players. It went over big and now fans are wanting it to become an every game happening.night. Sept. 7.
The 2018 Kimball High Football team put a halt to a 12 game losing streak that dates back to October 7, 2016, when they won out over Bayard 42-28, with an impressive 24-6 win over visiting Southwest Friday night. The Horns are showing signs of great improvement this season as they switched over to the 8-man game and came within inches of winning their season opener that they lost 36-30 in overtime to Garden County.
Coach Ben Aarestad said "This was a great win for the kids and the school. I think this can be just the beginning if the kids keep buying into what we are doing and how hard they have to work in order to get better. We had kids making big plays Friday night. I always talk about someone needs to step up and make some big plays, and in the past we were not able to do that."
Coach Aarestad said that his team still had too many penalties Friday night. "The first drive we were down to their five yard line and ready to score and then had three penalties in a row and failed to score. Our second drive we were down to their 10 yard line and ready to score and then had four penalties to prevent us scoring. We are still making mistakes that we need to correct, and we will," he said.
The Horns showed they came to play when on their first play of the game following the opening kickoff, Izaac Reuter connected with Zane Anthony who made a spectacular catch for a 35 yard gainer. As coach Aarestad mentioned, penalties hurt the cause early, but Ethan Greenwood came up with a big fumble early to give the Horns a chance to score that didn't happen. Southwest got on the score board first following a 55 yard drive with Ty Bennett going in from 1 yard out with 4:08 showing on the clock first period and led 6-0 after the PAT failed.
Kimball tied the game with 3:29 left in the first quarter when quarterback Izaac Reuter made a great cut-back move on a keeper and went in from 29 yards out. Reuter's conversation run failed.
The score remained tied at half time at 6-6 but the rest of the scoring was the result of three touchdowns by Kimball, all in the second half. The third quarter started with Kimball kicking off and Reuter came roaring in for a big sack and loss of yardage to force a Southwest punt. Ethan Ratzlaff got Kimball's go ahead TD on a two yard run with 1:38 showing on the clock in the third period and a pass form Reuter to Jacob Withrow failed for the conversion points.
The fourth quarter points came on a 24 yard pass from Reuter to Withrow with 6:03 to play, and then Jake Jenkins on a 20 yard sprint with :38 remaining . The conversion attempts on both touchdowns failed and the final score ended at 24-6. The game ended with Jenkins intercepting a Southwest pass attempt.
In the final stats, Kimball ran 60 plays to 54 for the visitors and had 288 total yards of offense to 104 for Southwest. Kimball averaged 4.8 yards per play, where 7 of 16 passing with one touchdown and one interception. Kimball had eight penalties for 90 yards while Southwest was whistled for 4 and 30 yards. The Horns had one turnover compared to three for Southwest. Kimball punted twice for a 37 yard average, and Southwest four times for 30 yards. Kimball led in first downs 19 to 10.
Reuter accounted for all Kimball's passing stats going 7 for 16 and 94 yards with one TD and one interception. Withrow had three catches for 41 yards and the TD, Zane Anthony 2 for 41 yards and Austin Lulf 2 for 12 yards. Anthony also had a big night rushing with 15 carries for 70 yards. Jenkins carried 8 times for 54 yards and 1 TD. Reuter had 11 carries for 40 yards and 1 TD. Ratzlaff 7 for 17 and 1 TD. Corey Travis had 2 carries for 12 yards and Blaynne Rohde 1 for 1 yard.
The defense was aggressive from start to finish with sophomore Brayden Tyan charted with 14 tackles including 8 solo stop and 6 assists and had 2 tackles for loss yardage. Zane Anthony had 7 solo stops and 6 assists, Ethan Greenwood was in on 12 tackles with 1 solo. Corey Travis in on 11 with 2 solo tackles, Reuter was 3 and 4 including 2.5 tackles for loss. Ratzlaff was 2 and 4 including 2.5 tackles for a loss, Withrow was 3 and 1, Christian Allen-Van Pelt 2 and 1 with 2 for loss of yardage, Jenkins was 1 and 2, and Lulf had a solo tackle.
Fresh from the big win, Kimball will be on the road this Friday traveling to Dundy County in the town of Benkleman for a 6:30 p.m. kickoff. Like most every game they are going to be involved in this season, they will be tested once again.
Commenting on individual play on the win over Southwest, coach Aarestad said "Reuter had a big run for us, a nice TD throw and had a great defensive game as well. Zane Anthony had a good game on both sides of the ball. Brayden Tyan had a great defensive game and led us in tackles. Jacob Withrow made a nice TD catch. Jake Jenkins had a long TD run and an interception."
Aarestad said "Dundy County is a young football team that has some good athletes and they do some nice stuff on both offense and defense. We need to be able to stop their tailback from running drives and make them run outside. We just need to make sure our kids are ready for a long bus ride and get off the bus and compete tomorrow night. Good things will happen for us if we play hard every play."
That long bus ride to Benkleman, the home of Dundy County, and once again, an early kickoff time of 6:30 p.m.
Southwest 6 0 0 0---6
Kimball 6 0 6 12--24