MCDERMITT — With some doubt on whether they were going to have a season or not, the McDermitt High School football team opened its year this past Saturday at home against Pyramid Lake.
The Bulldogs dressed nine players for the contest in their first action against a different team, while the Lakers were playing their second game of the year.
McDermitt provided a strong showing in the first half, only to see Pyramid Lake pull away for the 61-6 victory.
“The youth caught up with us quick,” said MHS coach Richard Egan. “There are a lot of new faces out there. We missed a few open tackles at the start and that hurt us. There were some broken plays that Pyramid took advantage of. We were out of position and that falls back on our youth. That is something that we need to correct.”
Behind a mixture of running backs and a hurry up offense, the Bulldogs took the opening drive of the game down to the Pyramid Lake 10-yard line but saw the possession end on downs.
It took just the Lakers three plays to get on the scoreboard, as Preston Matson broke a number of tackles for a 65-yard touchdown run and an 8-0 lead after the 2-point conversion. After forcing McDermitt to punt on the next drive, Pyramid Lake took a 15-0 lead, when Allen Tatsey returned a punt 40 yards for a touchdown.
The Bulldogs cut the deficit to 10 points, 64 seconds into the second quarter. Pyramid Lake fumbled deep in McDermitt territory and the Bulldogs took advantage of the mistake, scoring one play later on a 5-yard run by Kyon Egan.
Pyramid Lake came back to score twice more in the final 5:49 of the half. The first touchdown came on a 6-yard run by Jesse Valdes and the Lakers took a 30-6 lead into halftime after A.J. Wasson connected with Tatsey on a 38-yard touchdown pass with 2:32 left in the first half.
Pyramid Lake took control of the contest, scoring 23 points in less than three minutes to start the second half. The Lakers needed just 53 seconds to score in the third quarter, off a 7-yard run by Preston Matson. McDermitt turned the ball over the next times on offense and Pyramid Lake quickly capitalized. Brandon O’Daye rushed for a 65-yard and one play after a Bulldogs’ fumble, Kalei Freitas ran in from nine yards out to make the score 53-6 with 9:29 left in the third quarter. The game was played with a running clock for the remainder as part of the NIAA 45-point rule.
Pyramid Lake added their final touchdown with 2:50 left in the game on a 3-yard run by Tae New Moon.
“We need to learn from our mistakes and play like upperclassmen,” Egan said. “This is was our first time playing against each other. Now, we know the speed of the game. You could see a couple of those mistakes take the wind out of our sail. We want to get better off of this and we will look at film and see what we can improve on.”
McDermitt travels north to Oregon on Friday to take on Jordan Valley at 2 p.m. (MST).
