Junior Hornets finish season with 42-7 romp
EDITOR’S NOTE: Because the look back at each day in Bryant athletic history has been so favorably received during the time when there was no sports during the COVID-19 shutdown, BryantDaily.com will continueposting past stories of Bryant athletics either posted on BryantDaily.com (from 2009 to the present) or published in the Bryant Times (from 1998 to 2008).
By ROB PATRICK
BRYANT TIMES
Consider the list of injured players for the Bryant Hornets freshman football team this season:
Bobby Mulac missed seven games; Brennan Bullock broke his arm but played with a cast for much of the season; Chris Arnold had a scooter wreck but made it to the first scrimmage; Sergio Arias missed all of two-days and the first two games with a torn hip muscle; Allan Sloan missed three games with an ACL injury; Kaleb Burns missed four games with an ACL; Tanner Wood missed four games with a broken thumb; Ross Smith missed seven games; Jacob Dorrell missed a game or two; Tim Hampton missed four games with a pulled hamstring; and Damon Hestor missed three or four games with severe ankle sprain.
And there were more.
Add to that the fact that a pair of players the Hornets figured to depend on this season moved to other schools over the summer, and you can see how truly impressive it is that the team forged a 7-3 season including a final 42-7 romp over a Russellville East team that, earlier in the year, they had barely escaped with a 20-14 win.
The win was one of seven in eight “playoff” games between the teams of the South Division of the Central Arkansas Junior High Conference and their counterparts in the North. Bryant was the third seed from the South after tying Sheridan for third in the final standings. Their 14-7 win over the Stingers earned them the higher seed. Russellville East finished third in the North after defeating Russellville West.
The Hornets, as healthy as they’d been all season, finished the season impressively. The romp over Russellville East came on the heels of a not-that-close 35-22 win at Benton.
“You know, every coach talks about overcoming adversity,” acknowledged Hornets head coach Jason Hay, “whether it’s two-a-days, being tired. We always talk about that. And some injuries too. But we were able to overcome a ton of injuries including some missing nearly the whole season, people moving that we were counting on.”
The turning point, Hay noted, came midway through October. The Hornets had suffered losses in three of four games after a 2-0 start.
“We were sitting there 3-3 and I think we had our chance to fold,” he recalled. “We could’ve very easily been 3-7. That tells you a lot about the character of the kids. We continued to get better nearly every game. The last two games, we played the best football we played all year.
“The defense has really carried us the whole year,” he stated. “But I think, offensively, we finally got it going a little bit towards the end. I can’t say enough about how proud I am of the kids. They’ve done a great job.”
Hay acknowledged that the team exceeded some people’s expectations.
”I think everybody might’ve thought that but maybe the kids and the coaches,” he asserted. “And it doesn’t have anything to do with anything other than those kids refused to lose.”
Russellville East’s Whirlwinds got blown away right away. The Hornets scored 14 points before the ‘Winds ran their first play on offense. Taking the opening kickoff, Bryant drove 76 yards in 13 plays, pounding with the running of Brennan Bullock. Quarterback Jimi Easterling converted a fourth-and-7 from the Russellville 33 with a 9-yard scamper then, two plays later, threw a screen pass to Bullock who, behind tough blocking, rolled 25 yards for the first touchdown.
Bullock, coming off a 200-yard rushing performance at Benton, wound up with 158 yards on just 15 carries against Russellville.
The Hornets surprised the Whirlwinds with a pooch kick on the ensuing kickoff, taking advantage of the talents of kicker Sergio Arias. Tyler Groves recovered for Bryant at the Whirlwinds’ 34.
On the first play, the Hornets came out in what they call their “funky left” alignment, a contribution of assistant coach Dale Jones. A few linemen set up over the ball on the right hash with Easterling behind them. Outside the left hash, the rest of the linemen and receivers lined up in front of Arias. Russellville scrambled to try to cover everything while Easterling took the snap and fired a lateral to Arias. In turn, Arias threw deep to Chris Arnold who was behind the defense for a 34-yard touchdown.
And when Easterling passed to Arnold for a two-point conversion, Bryant led 14-0 with just 1:56 left in the first quarter.
Russellville covered the ensuing pooch kick and finally got its offense on the field. But, on the first play, a bad pitch cost them 12 yards and they never recovered.
Punted back to the 50, the Hornets went right back to “funky left” only this time, because the Whirlwind defense was so spread out, they ran an option and Easterling broke free for 24 yards. Three plays later, Bullock powered for a 21-yard touchdown run and Arias kicked it to 21-0 with 6:34 still to play in the first half.
Russellville picked up no yardage on its next possession even when it desperately went for it on fourth down. Bryant took over on downs at the Russellville 38. Easterling, on a tackle-eligible, fired a pass down the seam to Groves for 37 yards setting up a 1-yard sneak for another score, making it 28-0 with 5:06 still to play in the first half.
That held up for the halftime score.
To start the second half, another pooch kick was recovered by Mitchell Wise for the Hornets at midfield. With Bullock biting off big chunks of yardage including 12- and 19-yard runs, the Hornets scored in five plays, the last a Bullock run from the 2. So, when Arias added the extra point to make it 35-0 with 6:33 still to play in the third quarter, the mercy rule was invoked and the clock ran, only stopping for timeouts.
Russellville managed a couple of first downs on its subsequent possession, driving into Bryant territory. But, on a second-and-10 at the 46, quarterback Cole Smith optioned to his left and, as he was being tackled, tried to make a blind pitch to a trailing back only to have Bryant’s Stanley Oxner pick it off and race 55 yards for another Bryant score.
The Hornets turned to their reserves after that and Russellville drove for its only score but it took them 13 plays to cover 78 yards and the Hornets made a bid at a goal line stand. On a first-and-goal at the 7, Matt Neal dropped running back Jacob Sparks for a loss back to the 11. A pass to tight end Dakota Thiel managed just 4 yards thanks to a nice tackle by Jesse Loyd. A third-down run by Smith was piled up by the Hornets at the 2, forcing a fourth-and-goal. Smith wound up passing to tight end Aaron McConnell for the score but there was just 3:20 left in the game and the Bryant reserves on offense, behind the running of Nick Berry, ate that up after Hunter Alford recovered Russellville’s onside kick.
“It was a great, great year,” concluded Coach Hay.
