LITTLE ROCK — The Bryant Hornets football team went unbeaten including two wins over highly-regarded Pulaski Academy and another over defending champion Hot Springs Lakeside to capture the championship of the Pulaski Robinson 7-on-7 at Mighty Bluebird Field on Thursday.
Senior quarterback Jimi Easterling threw 19 touchdowns to eight different receivers on the day with only three interceptions while the Hornets defense came up with eight interceptions.
Bryant swept pool play 48-17 over England, 10-9 over Jacksonville and 28-27 over PA. In the latter game, Bryant offensive coordinator Dale Jones reported, "If you score, you don't have to make a PAT, you get 7 points but if you want to go for two, it's from the 10-yard line. Their second score, they decided to go for two and didn't get it so we kind of played ahead the rest of the game. As long as we scored and kept the ball, we were all right."
In the tournament round, the Hornets opened with a 34-0 romp over the host team. "They tried to play man-to-man (coverage) and it didn't work out too well," Jones mentioned.
They then ousted Lakeside 27-20 in the semifinals, avenging the loss to the Rams in the championship game last summer.
In the title contest, a re-match with Pulaski Academy, the Hornets prevailed 37-15.[more]
"And they scored a touchdown on the very last play," Jones said, "so we really dominated them."
The Bryant Hornets scored on the very first play of the contest. On the Bruins' first play, James Glasper, playing at outside linebacker, made the first of his two interceptions in the game to add 3 points to Bryant's total. The Hornets turned it into more points on the subsequent possession.
"So, it's 17-0 with 22 minutes left in a 25-minute game," Jones noted.
The Bruins put together an answering drive but were kept off the board by Glasper's second pick to make it 20-0. In turn, a deep completion from Easterling to Tanner Tolbert made it 27-0.
For the day, Stanley Oxner and Logan Garland also had two interceptions for the Hornets. Trey Sowell and Jacob Brady also contributed picks.
Offensively, senior Brandon Parish hauled in five touchdowns. Sophomore Sawyer Nichols had four.
"Once we got into tournament play, Sawyer stepped in at our inside slot receiver, our A receiver, and he really played well," Jones said. "He really played well in tournament play. That's what the defense was giving us."
Another sophomore Caleb Thomas had two touchdowns as did Tolbert, Garland and Chris Rycraw. Sammil Watson and Nic Moore caught a TD pass apiece.
"We spread it around pretty good," Jones acknowledged. "We just had one quarterback there.
"We were pleased," he added. "(Head coach Paul) Calley was particularly pleased. We executed real well and that's what I like to see. There was some good defense too. The most points we gave up all day was 27 and that's playing pretty good defense in 7-on-7. Glasper, Oxner, Watson, Tolbert and Garland all played well in the secondary. And we had some guys missing. We had probably five starters not there so the sophomores really got a chance to show what they could do on offense. We were real pleased with the effort."
The dead period for athletes and coaches begins Saturday. The Hornets football team will return to 7-on-7 competition with a league game on July 6 then a tournament at Fountain Lake on July 11. They'll play another league game on July 20 before beginning fall practice on Aug. 3. The 2009 season commences on Friday, Sept. 4, with the annual Salt Bowl at War Memorial Stadium against the Benton Panthers.
j garland
Great article. Thanks for the coverage.