BULLPUPS ROLL PAST VIKINGS!
By William for www.mcpherson-county-ks.com
(Post is SPONSORED BY CROSSDOVE WRITERS)
While the full house home crowd seemed to be getting anxious in the first half, the McPherson High football team finally flexed their offensive muscles and began what would become a 47-0 shutout season home debut victory over Winfield on Friday.
Outside of a five-yard scoring run by Jake Feil in the first quarter, the Bullpups offense sputtered until late in the first half when they scored twice in the final two minutes of the second quarter off scoring passes from Kaleb Hoppes of 25 yards to Feil and 14 yards to Cody Stufflebean, giving the home crowd a chance to relax with McPherson taking a 20-0 lead into the halftime break.
Coming out of halftime, the Bullpups, with Kaleb Hoppes being in the driver’s seat, pounded the ball down the field and scored three times to put the game out of reach for the visiting Vikings, 41-0.
Aaron Powell showed his extreme talents as a wide receiver when he one-handed a 25-yard scoring pass from Hoppes before the ground game pounded in the other two third stanza scores on a one-yard plunge from Aiden Hoover and a three-yard push from Hoppes.
Hoover topped the scoring off for the Bullpups in the fourth quarter when he dashed in from 36 yards out, giving the home crowd reasons to cheer with a 47-0 victory. Bullpup soccer star Drew Schrader took care of his job by nailing five extra points kicks.
“It took us awhile to get rolling,” noted Bullpup Head Coach Jace Pavlovich in his post-game reflections. “Our kids came out in the second half and executed really well. We have to get better upfront offensively. We have plenty of talent at that position group, we just have to put it together.”
While the Bullpup offense pounded the Viking defense for 163 rushing and another 271 passing, the defense in turn shutdown the Winfield offense by holding them to a total of 124 yards on 51 plays or just 2.43 yards per play. McPherson was averaging 7.89 yards per play on 55 offensive snaps and punted just once, while the Viking punter wore his foot out with eight punts on the night.
Coach Pavlovich concluded his reflections by praising his defense when he said, “Defensively, our guys executed incredibly well all night. Coach (Chet) Harlin put together a great game plan and our kids got after it all night.”
While no official defensive stats were available, the Bullpup roadblocks were led by Cody Stufflebean, Mason Thrash, Tyson Gottwald, Brycen Labertew (who had an interception), Curtis Landrum, Hoppes and Feil.
Individually on offense, Hoppes had a huge game with 289 yards in total offense, 271 coming in the air and another 18 on the ground. Feil gobbled up 74 yards on 15 carries and Hoover added another 71 yards on 10 carries while Powell once again went over 100 yards in receiving with 112 yards on six catches and sophomore Trey Buckbee took in another six passes for 61 yards.
The Bullpups are now 2-0 for the season and will be at home again next Friday when they play host to El Dorado. The Wildcats will come into the game 1-1 for the season after being buried 55-0 by Buhler on Friday.
WINFIELD AT MCPHERSON (Stats compiled by Steve Sell):
Scoring:
Winfield 0 0 0 0 = 0
Bullpups 7 13 21 6 = 47
1st Quarter: Bullpups – Jake Feil scores on a 5-yard run (Drew Schrader kick)
2nd Quarter: Bullpups – Jake Feil catches 25-yard pass from Kaleb Hoppes (Drew Schrader kick)
2nd Quarter: Bullpups – Cody Stufflebean catches 14-pass from Kaleb Hoppes (kick no good)
3rd Quarter: Bullpups – Aaron Powell catches a 25-yard pass from Kaleb Hoppes (Drew Schrader kick)
3rd Quarter: Bullpups – Aiden Hoover scores on a 1-yard run (Drew Schrader kick)
3rd Quarter: Bullpups – Kaleb Hoppes scores on a 3-yard run (Drew Schrader kick)
4th Quarter: Bullpups – Aiden Hoover scores on a 36-yard run (kick no good)
Team Stats:
Winfield Bullpups
First Downs 7 19
Rushing (Atts-Yards) 34-96 29-163
Passing (Comp-Atts-Yards) 6-17-28 17-26-271
Total Yards (Plays-Yards) 51-124 55-434
Turnovers (Fbles-Inter) 1-1 1-1
Punting (Atts-Avg) 8-30.2 1-30.0
Penalties (No – Yards) 5-34 7-63
McPherson Bullpup Individual Stats:
Passing – Kaleb Hoppes 17-26 for 271 yards with 1 interception
Rushing – Jake Feil 15 for 74 yards; Aiden Hoover 10 for 71 yards; Kaleb Hoppes 3 for 18 yards; Aaron Powell 1 for 5 yards
Receiving – Aaron Powell 6 for 112 yards; Trey Buckbee 6 for 61 yards; Jake Feil 2 for 40 yards; Jonah Clarke 1 for 25 yards; Riley Koehn 1 for 9 yards; Cody Stufflebean 1 for 14 yards
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