Wright City takes first half lead, falls to North Callaway

By John Rohlf, Sports Editor
Posted 10/12/22

A long rushing touchdown by North Callaway quarterback Braydn Neal swung the momentum against Wright City in their 32-13 loss last Friday. Wright City (4-3) jumped out to a 13-0 first half lead …

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Wright City takes first half lead, falls to North Callaway

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A long rushing touchdown by North Callaway quarterback Braydn Neal swung the momentum against Wright City in their 32-13 loss last Friday.
Wright City (4-3) jumped out to a 13-0 first half lead thanks to a pair of touchdowns and a strong defensive performance. Denzel Dowdy scored Wright City’s first touchdown of the game. He scored on a 18-yard touchdown run in the first quarter. Later in the first quarter, Jeremiah Davis scored on a 50-yard touchdown pass from Joey Gendron to give the Wildcats a 13-0 lead.
“It was just a great play by him,” Wright City football coach Tyler Rickard said. “It was kind of clogged up on the right side where it was designed to run and he turned it all the way back over to the left side and took it to the house. Just a good athlete making a great play.”
Rickard said the defense played very well in the first half. The Wildcats knew Neal was talented both throwing and running the ball. Rickard said the defense’s focus in defending Neal was to keep their eyes on Neal.
“Our linebackers did a very good job of keeping him contained in the first half,” Rickard said. “That was big for us to at least keep them shut out.”
Rickard said the Wildcats were feeling good going into halftime with a 13-0 lead. North Callaway’s first touchdown in the third quarter shifted the momentum in the game. Neal scored on an 80-yard rushing touchdown after the Wright City defense thought he was tackled on the play.
“It was one of those plays where our guy had tackled him, landed on the ground and the offensive player was on his stomach and as he pulled him over, everybody thought his knee went down,” Rickard said. “And so everybody on the field, all 21 people stopped except the quarterback. And he I guess just put his hand down is what the official told me. And so he got up and he kept running. That was a big momentum swing.”
North Callaway added another touchdown in the third quarter to take a 16-13 lead. They scored a pair of touchdowns in the fourth quarter to win the game 32-13. Wright City was unable to score in the second half.
Joey Gendron threw for 92 yards and a touchdown for the Wildcats. Duan McRoberts led the Wildcats on the ground with 70 yards rushing on 21 carries. Davis had 77 yards receiving and a touchdown. Davis also registered a sack on defense. McRoberts had an interception and Dowdy recovered a fumble.
Despite falling in their last two games, Wright City has jumped out to fast starts and held leads late in the second quarter of each game. Rickard said the Wildcats are doing a good job in the first half. They just need to sustain that play in the second half. They also are focusing on stopping a team’s momentum when it swings against the Wildcats. Wright City opponents have scored 28 and 32 unanswered points the past two weeks.
“We’ve got to find a way to make a play and swing that momentum back,” Rickard said. “It’s a mental thing as well. Just to not allow that to rattle us and to stay in tune with what we had been doing that whole game that had made us successful. And then going out and executing and just making a play.”
Wright City is slated to square off against Bowling Green (7-0) on the road this week. Bowling Green is winning games by an average of 63 points this season. Rickard noted Bowling Green has a good quarterback and two good running backs on offense.
“They’re going to try to establish the run early and then do a little play action pass off of it. Once they get a bunch of people creeping into the box, they’ll try to hit you over the top or hit you on the roll out,” Rickard said. “So I want to come out. We’re going to go out and compete. We schemed them up. We’re going to put our guys in the best position we can to be successful.”
This week’s game is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. Friday.


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