Center coach Bryan DeLong’s defense bent a lot more than he would’ve liked on Friday against Excelsior Springs, but it didn’t break in two crucial moments in the fourth quarter, which helped secure a 22-18 victory for the Yellowjackets.
“It was nice to see our kids not quit. We saw it last week in Oak Grove down 22-6 at halftime and we just didn’t get it done,” Center coach Bryan DeLong said. “We got outcoached tonight. Coach (Mark) Faubion and his staff kicked our tail all night. We had some kids on defense step up and make big plays inside the 10.”
The Tigers (1-2) had all the momentum with an 18-7 halftime lead and forced the Yellowjackets (3-1) to go three and out to begin the second half. They continued to put the foot on the gas by eating up the rest of the clock in the third quarter and nearly half of the fourth. However, after Excelsior Springs took the ball from its own 3-yard line and converted three fourth downs, including one on its own 12-yard line, the Tigers turned the ball over on downs at the Center 7-yard line.
“As athletic as they are, keeping them off the field was something that we had talked about all week. We did that and had 32 straight offensive plays in a row.” Faubion said. “I’ve never seen that before in my life. We’ve just got to capitalize on those things.”
All Center quarterback Joseph Vick wanted was a chance, and he got it, trailing by 11 with less than seven minutes to go. The Center sophomore channeled his inner Michael Vick with a 63-yard touchdown run on a broken play. Fellow sophomore Marquon Dorch ran it in on the 2-point conversion to cut Excelsior Springs’ lead to 18-15 with 5:52 to go.
After the Tigers went three and out on the ensuing possession, Vick got the ball back with a chance to give the Yellowjackets their first lead with the ball on the Center 48-yard line and 3:29 to play. Vick showed off his arm strength with he connected with Dorch on a corner route that resulted in a 38-yard touchdown pass.
“That’s my guy right there,” Vick said of Dorch. “He’s a big asset to the team and does everything on both sides of the ball.”
While the Yellowjackets gameplan was to go with their bread and butter run game for much of the night, they showed they could run an effective two-minute drill in crunch time, too. Excelsior Springs had one last chance with the ball on the Center 6-yard line with nine ticks left, but the play was snuffed out at the line of scrimmage.
“From what we did earlier in the game with being able to run the ball and get into tough situations with fourth downs and short yardage and punch those through, we were going to give our guys every chance to win that,” Faubion said. “We were going to go with what had been working and let our QB (Jared King) keep making the play he had made the entire game.”
The Tigers scored three first half touchdowns but were unable to convert their 2-point tries. Junior Dacey Hall gave the Tigers a big offensive spark midway through the first quarter with a 55-yard touchdown run for the game’s first points. King added a 1-yard score on a quarterback sneak and Carson Salisbury found pay dirt on a 7-yard run. The lone score of the first half for the Yellowjackets came on an 80-yard touchdown run by Nosa Ohanmu.
Faubion’s squad will gear up for another explosive offensive team when the Tigers take on Harrisonville at 7 p.m. Friday.
“They’ve got one of the best running backs in the city. That Jace (Reynolds) kid is spectacular. We’ll have to be ready to tackle him 90 plays in a row if we have to,” Faubion said. “They do a great job of getting him the ball in different situations. Our best defense will be keeping him off the field.”
DeLong had high praise for Faubion and his team for being ready to play despite limited practice time and missing their Week 2 game due to COVID-19 exposure. The Center head coach is hoping for a faster start when the Tigers play Warrensburg at 7 p.m. Friday.
“With what they did in a week in improving, I’m blown away by the Excelsior staff. If we had to take two weeks off of practice, it would be like Day One again,” DeLong said. “The way they played after three or four days of practice, they looked pretty good tonight against us. They looked a lot better than they did on film and that’s a tribute to their coaches and the hard work they put in.”
