By Gaylen Duskey
realfang@citlink.net
Most of the time when you have no penalties and your opponent has 10 for 95
yards; you have a turnover inside your opponent's 20 and score on
back-to-back offensive plays then you should be dancing a victory dance
after the game.
Wirt Middle School did all those things ⦠except the victory dance Thursday
night.
Instead it was visiting Calhoun Middle School coming out on top of a 28-20
contest in which the score was much, much closer than the game ever was.
How did all this happen?
Calhoun's defense flogged Wirt's offense. No, a little more specific,
Calhoun's first line defense flogged Wirt's offense. Wirt's first team did
hang a couple of quick touchdowns on the Calhoun second and third team
defenders late in the contest to make things appear much closer than they
were.
As a matter of fact Wirt's first down came when the White Tigers got the
ball on the 18 yard line following an interception of a Calhoun pass but
needed nine plays, including 20 yards in penalties against Calhoun, to get
on the board.
The missed extra point following Michael Sturm's seven yard scoring
reception from Logan Kerby left the score 8-6 in Calhoun's favor and that as
close as the game got, ever.
Other than that the Red Devils' defense, led by defensive linemen Jazz
Holcomb, Coy Bailey and Chris Lacy pounded Wirt's offense. Before three long
runs in the final minutes against the Calhoun substitutes the Red Devils
defense had held Wirt to three yards rushing and 33 yards passing.
Calhoun, 4-3, ended a three-game skid with a bang by jumping on the Tigers
early and often.
Curiously Wirt stopped Calhoun's first thrust but not before the Red Devils
drove deep into Tiger territory before turning the ball over on downs.
But Wirt was unable to move the ball and punted it back to Calhoun.
This time the Red Devils would not be stopped and Johnny Taylor put his team
on the board with a 36-yard run at the 1:35 mark of the first. Casey Ritchie
hit Taylor with the conversion pass and the 8-0 lead.
Wirt would score to draw close but the the roof caved in.
First there was the mistake of kicking the ball off to Taylor. Seventy-one
yards later he was in the end zone and Calhoun had pushed its lead to 14-8.
His touchdown was his fourth kickoff return touchdown this season.
Calhoun got on the board again not long after when Houston McCune
intercepted a Wirt pass at the 47 and took it all the way down to the one.
He was then inserted into the tailback spot and his one-yard scoring run
gave the Red Devils a 20-6 halftime lead.
Calhoun upped the lead to 28-6 in the third quarter when Taylor scored from
27 yards out and added the extra point conversion on a pass from Casey
Ritchie. The rushing touchdown was his 11 of the season. Taylor now has
1,101 yards on 119 carries through seven games.
Following that Calhoun pulled most of the starters and by early in the final
period had pulled all the starters. That's when Wirt got on the board with a
37 yard run by Pat Toney followed by a 60 yard run by Logan Kerby.
Wirt, now 0-7, plays Pleasants County to close out its season while Calhoun
travels to Walton to finish the regular season. With a win and a Spencer
win over Clay Calhoun would finish in a three-way tie for the CVWAC West
Division title setting up some sort of conference tiebreaker ruling.
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