Monahans routs Sweetwater

**Kevin** Sun Sep 13, 2009 2:44 pm

The three remaining local survivors (from left), Albert Simmons, Robert Headrick, and Bill May, who played in Mustang Bowl its inaugural season (1939), were honored before Saturday night’s homecoming game against Monahans

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Monahans routs Sweetwater
Written by Ron Howell
Saturday, 12 September 2009
Last Updated ( Saturday, 12 September 2009 )

The rainy weather that was present for most of Friday failed to slow down Sweetwater’s homecoming or have a significant effect on the football game which capped off the festivities. Unfortunately, the visiting team did a lot more than the weather to dampen the night’s enthusiasm.
Monahans, looking every bit as good as its No. 12 state ranking in Class 3A would suggest, dominated from start to finish as it rolled to a 48-0 victory.
The Loboes out-gained the Mustangs 445-123 and also took advantage of four turnovers, as well as great field position, to get its first win this decade in the teams’ long rivalry.
Sweetwater (0-3) — still looking for its first victory under new coach Craig Slaughter — got an early hint that it might be in for a long night when Loboes quarterback Quincy Titus completed a 60-yard pass to Matt Roark on the first play of the game. The pass play to Roark gave Monahans a first-and-goal at the Mus-tangs’ 1, and Titus ran it over two plays later.
Then, after forcing a quick three-and-out, the Loboes (2-0) started at Sweetwa-ter’s 48 after a short punt and cashed in again when Titus completed a 3-yard pass to Byron Scharf for a 14-0 lead with 5:05 still left in the first quarter.
The Mustangs’ defense stopped Monahans at mid-field on its next possession, but even that worked to the Loboes’ advantage as Roark’s punt was killed at Sweetwater’s 1.
Once again the Mustangs had to punt it away after just three plays, setting up another short touchdown drive that began at Sweet-water’s 43 and ended with Monahans’ Colby Denton scoring on a 10-yard run to give the Loboes a 21-0 lead with 8:23 remaining in the second quarter.
Sweetwater’s offense — which had managed a sin-gle first down to that point — finally got moving as the Mustangs used a pair of Jake Lawrence-to-Jason Vause pass completions and a pass interference penalty to get to Monahans’ 38.
But the Loboes allowed just one more yard before taking over on downs, and Sweetwater never seriously threatened again. Mona-hans settled for a 21-0 lead at intermission after coming up two yards shy of the end zone to end the half.
“We were still hoping (at that point) that we could make a positive move or two and get back in the game,” Slaughter said.
But things just got worse.
The Loboes nearly dou-bled their lead in the third quarter with three more touchdowns for a 41-0 advantage — and two of the scores came after turnovers, something Sweetwater had avoided in the opening half.
Monahans’ three scoring “drives” in the period began at the Mustang 34-, 45- and 15-yard lines.
The scoring didn’t stop after the Loboes began put-ting in their subs, either, as backup Andrew Gaona got Monahans’ last points on a 47-yard run with 9:45 left in the contest.
“We’re still developing as a football team,” Slaughter said. “We knew that (Mona-hans) was good, and they were outstanding. They are a senior-loaded team that can run or throw.”
Titus, who sat out the Loboes’ season opener with an ankle injury, was a con-stant thorn in Sweetwater’s side as he accounted for a total of 191 yards and four scores, including three rushing. “We were pretty sure he would play,” Slaughter said. “We tried to make the kids aware of what he can do, but we couldn’t stop him.”
Lawrence was Sweetwat-er’s top rusher as he gained 51 yards on five carries.
Sweetwater still has two more games plus an open date before the start of district play on Oct. 9, but things don’t look to be getting any easier. Clyde (2-1), where Slaughter coached the past three seasons, welcomes the Mustangs to its new stadium this Friday after beating Early 14-7 this week.
Then Sweetwater goes to Big Spring — which is off to an impressive 3-0 start with victories over Snyder, Class 4A power Denison and Pampa so far — the following week.
“We’d better forget about this one and get prepared for the next one,” Slaughter said, “because I definitely know that Clyde will be ready for us.”

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