BATTLE MOUNTAIN - It wasn't pretty at times Thursday night, but the Battle Mountain High School varsity football team earned the No. 2 seed in the Northern 2A with a 42-8 win over Rite of Passage.
Without either scoring an offensive touchdown, the Rams led 8-6 early in the first quarter, before watching the Longhorns score the final 36 points of the night.
"It wasn't our best at times tonight," said BMHS head coach Tim Knight. "You look up at the scoreboard and it doesn't seem like we scored that many points. They played weird on defense and it was odd that you didn't have any dominating drives. We drove down the field and it wasn't dominant. We just passed the ball. You never feel secure. When you are running someone over, you feel secure. When you're passing the ball like we did, you never know. You can have drops like we did or get intercepted and stall a drive."
The Longhorns (6-1 Northern 2A, 6-3 overall) caught the first break of the night as Kyle Bryant intercepted Rite of Passage's Shaiitarrio Brown on the game's fifth play and returned it for a 40-yard touchdown and a 6-0 lead after the missed extra point.
Rite of Passage struck quickly, as Andre Sutherland took the ensuing kickoff back 91 yards for a touchdown and an 8-6 Ram advantage after a made two-point conversion by Willie Gaither.
However, those were all the points for Rite of Passage on the night, as the Longhorn defense held the Rams to just 150 yards of total offense.
After going three-and-out on their initial drive of the night and stopping Rite of Passage at the 30-yard line, the Longhorns began a 70-yard drive that put them out in front for good. Joey Cook and Daniel Itza had two long runs to move the ball to the Rite of Passage 40-yard line. It took just a handful of plays later for Itza to connect with Bryant on a 15-yard pass to give the Longhorns the lead for good at 14-8 with 4:21 left in the first quarter.
A 29-yard punt return by Cook early in the second quarter helped jumpstart Battle Mountain on its next drive. The Longhorns took advantage of the short field and drove 22 yards, capped off by a 4-yard run by Hank Filippini. David DeAndreis added the two-point conversion to make the score 22-8.
Chris Johnson recovered a Rite of Passage fumble on the ensuing drive, giving the Longhorns excellent field position once again. It appeared a fumble that Battle Mountain recovered might put an end to the drive, but the Longhorns picked up a break on fourth and 13 on a pass interference call on the Rams. With the second life, Itza ran for 17 yards down to the 2-yard line and Ryan Salazar ended the drive with a 2-yard run, giving Battle Mountain a 28-8 halftime lead.
Battle Mountain overcame an interception on its first drive of the second half to add 14 more points in the third quarter. DeAndreis had a 5-yard run with 4:21 left in the quarter, and Jeremy Drown scored on a 1-yard touchdown run with 27 seconds left in the period for the final points of the night.
"It's not the same ROP team of the past but our defense played pretty good," Knight said. "We have to clean up some things on offense. We have to hold on to the ball better and make the catches that we are dropping. Over the past couple of weeks, teams have been playing so deep on us and not letting us get the long pass off. Our game at the start of the season was going deep on teams and right now we are having a tough time settling for the underneath stuff."
Battle Mountain plays host to Yerington in the opening round of the NIAA 2A State Championships Friday at 5:30 p.m. It will be the third time in four weeks that the teams are playing. The Longhorns beat the Lions 13-0 on Oct. 14 in Battle Mountain. Yerington came back on its home field to win 44-6 in a non-conference matchup. The winner of the game will likely travel to Ely to face White Pine on Saturday, Nov. 12.
"We know what we are going to get with Yerington," Knight said. "We are going to have to be ready for them. It's going to be a battle and we are going to have to fight our butt off to win."
[[In-content Ad]]Northern 2A Playoffs
Friday, Nov. 4
Yerington at Battle Mountain, 5:30 p.m.
ROP at Pershing County, 6 p.m.
