Win streak at 27; Clay Lewis tops most playoff teams coached at 9
HobbsDailyReport.com
MORGANTON – Hibriten High stayed red-hot, wiping out host Patton 44-0 on Friday night in a Northwestern Foothills 2A game to repeat as a league champion and win for the 27th straight game.
The Panthers (11-0, 6-0), defending state 2AA champions, also won their 34th consecutive regular season game as they picked up career win No. 92 for head coach Clay Lewis (92-28, ninth year).
LEWIS
Running back McKinley (Gee) Witherspoon had TD runs of 2 and 17 yards in the second quarter – his 30th and 31st of the season – and Marqwone Jones and quarterback Jaylen Scott also had big games for Hibriten.
Jones ran for 120 yards and a score and Scott had scoring runs of 1 and 39 yards and threw a 57-yard TD pass to Marcus Jones in the victory.
Hibriten outgained Patton by nearly 370 yards.
Patton dropped to 6-5 overall and 4-2 in the conference in Jonathan Browning’s first year as head coach and finishes in third place in the Northwestern Foothills 2A behind Hibriten and Fred T. Foard.
Browning was promoted to head coach after Tom Eanes resigned to become head coach at Bandys.
Hibriten has now won 41 of its last 42 games and will advance to the state playoffs for the 17th straight season.
Patton will have to wait and see if it earns what would be its fourth straight postseason bid and sixth in its 11-year history of varsity football.
Notes
Patton has beaten Hibriten once in 12 meetings, 22-20 at Hibriten in 2015 … The series includes two state playoff games, with Hibriten winning 41-0 at home in 2013 and 35-0 at home in 2017 … Hibriten has outscored Patton 154-0 in the last four battles… Lewis had coached Hibriten to three straight league titles and the school has won eight since the late 1970s (seven outright, one share)…This is Lewis’ ninth playoff qualifier, passing by one the number of postseason teams guided by Chuck Cannon, whom Lewis replaced in 2010.