Sep. 11—GREENWOOD 31, NORTH AUGUSTA 7
NORTH AUGUSTA — North Augusta head football coach Jim Bob Bryant estimated that his Yellow Jackets probably should’ve led Greenwood 21-7 midway through Friday’s home opener.
The defense was playing well despite allowing a couple of big plays to Greenwood’s tricky option offense, and the Jackets’ own offense was moving the ball well — but with a couple of exceptions.
Those exceptions — a missed assignment here, a dropped pass there — were why North Augusta trailed 14-7 midway through instead of leading by a couple of scores, and those miscues struck again in the second half of Greenwood’s 31-7 win.
“Greenwood’s a really good football team all the way around,” Bryant said. “I thought we played pretty good in the first half, especially defensively. Gave up a couple big plays. We’ve got to execute on offense a little bit better in the first half.
“We missed some assignments, dropped a couple of passes that should’ve been touchdowns. … We didn’t execute. We didn’t make plays, and they did. When you let a good team hang around like that and they make plays and you don’t, this is what it becomes.”
Christian Jackson’s 3-yard touchdown run with 4 minutes left in the first half tied the game at 7, and it punctuated a quality drive for North Augusta (2-2) that included several third-down conversions against a tough Greenwood defense.
The Eagles (4-0), ranked fifth in Class AAAA, scored 24 consecutive points from there, however, and a 75-yard scoring drive put them ahead 14-7 with 1:24 left in the first half.
Greenwood rushed for 246 yards and four touchdowns, and a bulk of those yards came when an option pitch tricked the North Augusta defense. The Eagles had seven runs of 14 yards or more, and those carries alone totaled 187 yards. Vermareon Morton led the way with 81 yards and a score on 16 carries, quarterback Daylan Rappley rushed 10 times for 73 yards and a touchdown, and Jaylen Robinson had 66 yards and a touchdown on four attempts.
“Those offenses are tough to stop,” Bryant said. “That’s why college teams, when they play Navy and Army they do a 20-minute period every day all year on option football because you just don’t see it every day. They run it really, really well. They’re a really well-coached team. We saw some good things tonight, but we saw a lot of things we’ve got to fix.”
North Augusta’s offense, on the other hand, found it tough to get much going behind a line loaded with inexperience.
DJ Curry carried the ball 14 yards and was able to grind out 50 yards, greeted by a gang tackle on each touch. Colson Brown went 8-for-13 passing for 136 yards in the first half but finished the game 9-for-27 for 150 yards and an interception. At one point, he went 10 consecutive attempts without a completion, with the bulk of those coming when North Augusta needed to move the ball through the air to try to slice into the deficit.
“DJ and Christian are two really good backs,” Bryant said. “We’re going to be good on the offensive line, but right now we’re just very, very inexperienced. We don’t have one guy starting on the offensive line tonight that started in the spring game. They’re coming along. They’re getting better every week, but we’ve got to get a lot better before next week when we play Burke County.”
North Augusta thought it had taken the lead in the final minute of the first quarter, but officials ruled that the Jackets didn’t cross the goal line on third or fourth down from the Greenwood 1-yard line.
The Eagles caught the Jackets peeking into the backfield to stop the run, and Rappley found a receiver all alone behind the secondary for a 93-yard gain that set up a 3-yard Morton touchdown.
North Augusta had a chance to make it a one-score game down 21-7 with 3:40 left in the third quarter, but a Brown pass attempt was tipped and intercepted at the Jackets’ 32. The Eagles cashed in with a Billy Pruitt field goal, then scored on their next possession to put the game away.
North Augusta will be back at home again next Friday for a non-region game against Georgia opponent Burke County.
G 0 14 7 10 — 31
NA 0 7 0 0 — 7
SCORING SUMMARY
Second Quarter
G — Vermareon Morton 3 run (Billy Pruitt kick) 10:57
NA — Christian Jackson 3 run (Drew Stevens kick) 4:00
G — Jaylen Robinson 22 run (Pruitt kick) 1:24
Third Quarter
G — Ty Patterson 17 run (Pruitt kick) 8:00
Fourth Quarter
G — Pruitt 27 field goal 11:06
G — Daylan Rappley 7 run (Pruitt kick) 6:11
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
Rushing
G — Vermareon Morton 16-81-1, Daylan Rappley 10-73-1, Jaylen Robinson 4-66-1, Ty Patterson 5-22-1, Team 3-4. Totals 38-246-4.
NA — DJ Curry 14-50, Taylon Washington 1-9, Christian Jackson 5-3-1, Colson Brown 8-(-7). Totals 28-55-1.
Passing
G — Daylan Rappley 4-6-123-1-0.
NA — Colson Brown 9-27-150-0-1.
Receiving
G — No. 6 1-93, Vermareon Morton 1-13, No. 3 1-4, Billy Pruitt 1-2. Totals 4-123-1.
NA — Christian Jackson 2-54, Taylon Washington 4-51, DJ Curry 1-18, Kaden Usry 1-17, Zach Johnson 1-5, No. 28 1-5. Totals 9-150.