Stephenville Surges Past Heritage in Opener

Photo credit to Logan Smith

Stephenville, TX—The Jackets were behind Midlothian Heritage 21-14 in a back-and-forth contest. The outcome seemed that it would probably hinge on a late score. After all, so many games between these two teams in the past have ended that way. However, this year’s Stephenville squad had other ideas. A 30-0 run by the Jackets would finish out the scoring and Stephenville would go to 1-0 on the season following a 44-21 victory.

The opening game felt to be the hottest in recent memory, temperature-wise. The Jacket offense then matched that pace with their team stats. Stephenville finished with 471 total yards, 378 of that coming through the air. QB Trot Jordan threw for all of those yards and three touchdowns. He also ran for 43 yards including a 32 yard score.

The Jacket receiving corp was led by Caden Monk. The sophomore would haul in 11 catches for 242 yards including one TD. Austin Jergins would bring in two scores on four catches for 78 yards. Both of these two receivers had over 900 yards receiving last season in the state championship run.

The rest of the receiving stats included Jhett Banuelos with a catch for 41 yards, Kendall Douglas a catch for nine yards and Zyler McClendon with one for eight yards. McClendon also led the team in rushing with 50 yards and one touchdown.

Defensively, so much was talked about this new squad having to replace one of the strongest defenses in Stephenville history. Graduation saw the War Dog defense lose eight three-year starters and several other key rotational players. Last year’s defense allowed an average of only eight points per game through the 16 game run. But this is this year’s defense.

Halfway through the second quarter it appeared the defense would take some time to find its way as Heritage had scored 21 and was gashing the Jackets on big plays. At this point the Jackets turned off the faucet. Stephenville would shutout the Jaguars for the remaining time including five sacks, forcing three turnovers and blocking a punt for a TD. The Jackets would also stop the opponent on their three final fourth-down attempts. Linebacker Carter VanZandt led the defense with 10 tackles. Jackson Richmond recovered two fumbles and Kolson Tomlinson recovered the other. Cooper Rudd was credited with forcing one of the fumbles and VanZandt another.

Stephenville will retain its number one ranking in the state as the Jackets ready themselves to travel to Brownwood this week for the annual Battle of 377. Stephenville has won the last six in the series. The game is scheduled for a 7pm kick.