Football Pats downed by Anderson 28-14

Published 12:45 pm Thursday, October 3, 2019

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LAWRENCEBURG — Lincoln County saw its quest for a road win slip away Friday night, as the Anderson County Bearcats scored three unanswered touchdowns in the second half to claim a 28-14 win on Bob Ware Field.

The Patriots and Bearcats traded touchdowns over the first three quarters of play, with Lincoln owning the early leads, 7-0 and 14-7. Anderson scored once in the third to knot the game at 14-all then followed with two more touchdowns in the fourth for the win.

“Once again, we lose a game that I felt like we could have won,” Lincoln coach Spencer Crutchfield said. “We put ourselves in position. We just had an unfortunate … the second score they had our corner catches a cramp and just bad luck. But you’ve got to play through those things. We’ve got to come back and answer. You’ve got to give credit to those guys. They’re a really good football team and they’ve got some really good players.”

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Lincoln (3-3) posted the game’s first lead with 4:41 to play in the first quarter when Zack Hazlett, who led the Lincoln offense with three catches for 104 yards and seven carries for 60 yards, pulled in a Nick Harris pass and took it 80 yards to the end zone. The play came on the first play of the Patriots’ second possession. Loren Melton booted the point after kick for a 7-0 lead.

The score stayed that way until the 4:44 mark of the second quarter. After holding Lincoln on downs, Anderson (4-2) took over at its own 39. The drive was helped along by first-down runs by Kynan Russell and quarterback Jagger Gillis and a personal foul penalty on the Patriots. The 61-yard, nine-play drive culminated in a 4-yard touchdown run by Gillis. Gabe Clark’s kick evened the game at 7-all.

After a Lincoln 3-and-out, the Bearcats were threatening again late in the half. A pass interference call on the Patriots and a first-down run by Gillis helped set the Bearcats up at the Lincoln 34, but the play would end in an turnover as Justin Bryant intercepted a Gillis pass at the Patriot 1-yard line.

The 7-7 score stood at the break.

It looked like Lincoln retook the lead on the opening play of the second half, as Clayton Davis sprinted 89 yards to the end zone on the opening kickoff. However, the play was nullified on a holding penalty.

“It is what it is. We made a play. They call it back. So we’ve got to make another one. We didn’t do that,” said Crutchfield. “It was one of those things. It hurts when you get a 90-yard touchdown return called back.”

Lincoln attempted to get some points on the scoreboard on the drive, bringing on Melton to attempt a 48-yard field goal on 4th-and-5, but the kick was wide right.

The Patriots would tally on their next offensive drive. Harris capped off the team’s second possession, a 52-yard, nine-play drive, with a 2-yard touchdown run with 1:20 left in the third for a 14-7 lead.

The lead lasted less than a minute Gillis, who completed 10 of 17 passes for 107 yards, hit Sam Herrod for a 52-yard touchdown pass with just 27.7 ticks left in the third to deadlock the game once again.

The Bearcats took their first lead of the game midway through the fourth quarter. On its longest sustained drive, 86 yards in 14 plays, Anderson threw for three first downs and rushed for three, as well, to place the ball at the Lincoln 10, and Gillis hit Kynan Russell for the 10-yard TD pass to go up 21-14 with 5:28 to play.

One minute, six seconds later, Zach Labhart, who led the Bearcats with 149 yards on 18 carries, ran the ball in from the 35-yard line for the 28-14 final.

The Patriots marched down to the Bearcat 20 on the ensuing possession but the drive ended after five plays with Labhart intercepting the ball with just 3:07 left in the game. The Bearcats then proceeded to run out the clock.

“We’ve just got to go on an off week and continue to get better. That’s what I told them. I told them, ‘Nobody feels sorry for us.’ We’ve got to go back to work and lock in and do things the right way,” Crutchfield said. “The rest of our teams on our schedule are good teams. Our district is loaded. And then we play Rock at the end of the year. I told them we’re a couple steps or just right there on the edge, the verge of being a really good football team. We just have to make the plays when they’re available and do things the right way all the time. We have a couple breakdowns here and there tonight and you can’t have that against good football teams.”

Lincoln had 301 yards total offense, with 186 passing yards and 115 rushing. Anderson had 359 total yards, 252 rushing and 107 passing.

Defensively, Robert Bowman led Lincoln with 13 tackles, including seven solo tackles. Darren Griffin also put up double-digit defense with 10 tackles, four solos.

at Anderson Co.
Lincoln 7 0 7 0 – 14
Anderson 0 7 7 14 – 28

Scoring
1st Qtr
Lincoln: 4:11 – Zack Hazlett 80-yard pass from Nick Harris (Loren Melton kick).

2nd Qtr
Anderson: 4:44 – Jagger Gillis 4-yard run (Gabe Clark kick).

3rd Qtr
Lincoln: 1:28 – Harris 2-yard run (Melton kick).
Anderson: :27.7 – Sam Herrod 51-yard pass from Jagger Gillis (Clark kick).

4th Qtr
Anderson: 5:28 – Kynan Russell 10-yard pass from Gillis (Clark kick).
Anderson: 4:22 – Zach Labhart 35-yard run (Clark kick).

Game Stats
LC AC
Rushing 27-115 38-252
Passing 12-22-2 10-17-0
Yards 186 107
Total Off./Yds 49-301 55-359
First Downs 13 20
Fumbles/Lost 0/0 0/0
Penalties 7/54 5/37

Individual Stats
Rushing
Lincoln
Zack Hazlett: 7 carries, 60 yards.
Dylan Burchfield: 10 carries, 32 yards.
Nick Harris: 8 carries, 19 yards, TD.
Rodney Alcorn: 1 carry, 3 yards.
Levi Daugherty: 1 carry, 1 yard.

Anderson
Zach Labhart: 18 carries, 149 yards, TD.
Jagger Gillis: 12 carries, 72 yards, TD.
Austin Beasley: 2 carries, 16 yards.
Kynan Russell: 6 carries, 15 yards.

Passing
Lincoln
Nick Harris – 12-22-2, 186 yards, TD.
Receiving
Zack Hazlett – 3-104 yards, TD; Clayton Davis – 8-76; Levi Daugherty – 1-6.

Anderson
Jagger Gillis – 10-17-0, 107 yards, 2TDs.
Receiving
Sam Herrod – 4-71 yards, TD; Kynan Russell – 2-17, TD; Jackson Snyder – 2-14; Austin Beasley – 1-10; Zach Labhart – 1-(-5).