Undefeated Scots stomp Jay (09/11/04)

ALEXANDRIA — Jay County finally played a football game without rain. Unfortunately, the clear skies were the highlight of the night.

The Patriots went without an offensive touchdown for the second time in four games, and allowed three scoring plays of more than 30 yards in a 35-0 shutout to the Anderson Highland Scots at Alexandria Friday.

“We knew the big plays were going to happen, and we knew we’d have to fight back from adversity when it struck,” said Jay County coach Shane Hill, whose offense also went scoreless in a 33-2 opening-game loss to Delta. “We didn’t handle that very well tonight. We kind of rolled over a little bit.

“We had sparks at times where we looked OK, but overall we’ve got to really evaluate our heart and our effort on the field down after down.”

The Patriot defense stood tall on the first Highland drive, stopping the Scots on a fourth-and-four try from the 10-yard line. But after a three-and-out the quasi-home team came alive.

Highland (4-0), which is playing its home games on three different fields this year as its home turf is being renovated, scored quickly on its second drive. Dylan Shepard ran up the middle for 10 yards on the first play, and then quarterback Kai McCurdy hit Rodney Woodall with a 34-yard touchdown pass.

After another Jay County punt, the Scots put together a seven-play drive. It again ended on a 34-yard scoring pass, this time from McCurdy to Anthony Wilson.

Wilson also took care of the third big offensive score, splitting the safetys on a 53-yard run for the second of three third-quarter touchdowns.

Shepard scored first in the third quarter, returning a fumble for a score. He busted up the middle untouched, tipped the pitch from quarterback Adam Foster to tailback Justin Gilbert and took the ball 25 yards for the score.

Wilson scored a third touchdown on a 2-yard run, which came one play after a 40-yard pass from McCurdy to Woodall.

“We’ve done that all year,” said Highland coach Randy Albano of the big plays. “We threw the ball a little more than we have in other games and Kai (McCurdy) did a nice job.”

Woodall took most of McCurdy’s throws, catching five passes for 111 yards. McCurdy went 6-of-15 through the air for 145 yards.

Wilson did the majority of the damage on the ground, carrying 24 times for 155 yards. In all the Scots picked up 251 yards on the ground and totaled 396 of offense overall.

Jay County made it to the red zone twice, but failed both times.

In the second quarter the Patriots had a first-and-goal from the 8-yard line after a pass interference call, but quarterback Cory Locke was mobbed on the next play and fumbled the ball away.

Aided by two personal fouls and two pass interference calls, they made it all the way to the 5-yard line early in the fourth quarter, but were shut down on a fourth-and-goal try.

Jay County (1-3), which fumbled the ball nine times last week only losing one, had much worse luck against the Scots. The Patriots lost the ball each of the four times they put it on the ground.

They couldn’t establish any kind of running game, gaining just six total yards on 35 carries.

“We started turning it over in the second half and it (hurt us),” said Hill. “We turned the ball over at crucial times tonight — one they converted into a touchdown. You can’t give away points, especially against a team as talented as Highland.”

“We have got to put some consistency together on both sides of the ball and I think when that happens I think we’ll be a pretty good ball team, but we’re definitely not there yet.”

Locke went 3-of-5 passing for 37 yards before leaving the game early in the second half after re-aggravating an ankle injury. Foster went 2-of-5 for 22 yards in relief and was intercepted once.

Devon Huftel was the only rusher to put up positive numbers, carrying the ball eight times for 39 yards. All of his carries came in the first half.

Jay County returns from its three-game road trip Friday night when it hosts Muncie Southside at 7:30 p.m.[[In-content Ad]]