Foard off to 0-5 start after falling at St. Stephens
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The ball stayed in the air on Friday night at Draughn High – a lot – and the Wildcats rolled past visiting Avery County 48-22 behind another big night from quarterback Braxton Cox.
Cox threw for 383 yards and six scores, outdueling Avery County quarterback Troy Hoilman, as the Wildcats improved to 3-2.
Cox, a senior, found wide receiver Khe-nai Banks three times for TDs as Draughn won its third straight game.
Banks had six catches for 212 yards, including scoring receptions of 69, 80 and 25 yards.
Hoilman, a junior completed 38 of 70 passes for 373 yards and three TDs for Avery County (3-2).
The game included 1,062 yards of total offense – 539 by Draughn and 523 by Avery County.
Unofficially, Cox has 1,101 passing yards and 15 TD passes, 11 of them in the last two games. Banks has 22 catches for 339 yards and five scores.
Hoilman has thrown for 1,504 yards and 21 TDs in five games for the Vikings.
St. Stephens 26, Fred T. Foard 21
St. Stephens, riding 100-yard games by Zac McLauchlin and Matthew Hancock, nipped visiting Fred T. Foard in a non-league game to pick up head coach Wayne Hicks’ 25th win with the Indians.
McLauchlin had 24 carries for 189 yards with two scoring runs and Hancock added more 1117 yards on 17 carries to lead St. Stephens (2-2), now 25-47 under Hicks in his seventh season.
Quarterback Connor Williams threw a TD pass to Zach Lee to get St. Stephens’ first points, and Williams later had a short yardage scoring run.
Corey Siemer, who had 247 yards against the Indians a year ago when Foard (0-5) won 38-22, cleared 170 yards and scored twice for the Tigers.
Foard is still without a win under returning head coach Ryan Gettys, who guided the Tigers to 30 wins in eight seasons in his first tenure as head coach.
The Tigers still lead the series 20-18 in games since 1980. The teams had split the 18 games played during that span on St. Stephens’ field.
West Lincoln 61, East Burke 29
Running backs Cannon Bridges and Xander Pendergrass combined for 325 of the visiting Rebels’ 456 rushing yards as they won a non-league game to remain unbeaten (4-0).
Bridges and Pendergrass each had four rushing TDs, and Bridges finished with 19 carries for 174 yards and Pendergrass had 151 yards on 12 carries.
West Lincoln had 544 yards on offense.
East Burke (1-3) gained a 14-13 lead early via TD runs by Josh Moore of 1 and 25 yards. The other Cavs’ points came on a TD throw from quarterback Seth Pruitt to Luke Coble. Pruitt, after recovering from an injury, was in the lineup for East Burke for the first time this season.
Scoring runs of 11 and 28 yards by Bridges in the first quarter got the Rebels’ hot hand started before Pendergrass ran 16 and 5 yards for TDs in the second quarter. Bridges’ 6-yard TD run also came before halftime.
In the third quarter, Pendergrass scored on runs of 9 and 21 yards and Bridges had a 14-yard TD run.
Grayson Barkley and Ty Phansook had scoring runs for West Lincoln in the final quarter.
Bridges led West Lincoln defensively with 10 tackles – two for lost yardage – and he broke up three passes.
Chandler Carpenter added seven tackles – three for lost yardage – and had a sack and Pendergrass, Hunter Leonhardt, Evan Rye and Tubby Neal each had four tackles for West Lincoln.
West Iredell 32, North Iredell 3
The Warriors jumped to a 25-0 lead by halftime en route to a non-conference home win.
The win was the 15th for West Iredell head coach Monte Simmons (15-34), who is in his fifth season.
West Iredell improved to 2-2 and North Iredell is 0-5 and has been outscored 172-38 this season.
No other game details were available.