Clyde spoils Slaughter’s return

Statman from gofridaynight.com posed with Sweetwater High School varsity cheerleaders during Friday’s game in Clyde. Varsity cheerleaders are Kaitlen Harrison, Aubra Hendrix, Morgan Runge, Morgan Gomez Kelsey Jones, Genea Cherry, Briana Munoz and Brittany Lashinski

Clyde spoils Slaughter’s return
Written by Ron Howell
Saturday, 19 September 2009


Bulldogs score in OT to keep Mustangs winless CLYDE — It was a game that had everything.
Everyone knew the back story: Two former district opponents (Sweetwater and Clyde) meeting in Clyde for the first time since the home team’s coach the past three years (Craig Slaughter) left town to be on the sideline of the visiting team (Sweet-water), while also coaching against his former assistant at Clyde (David Ritchey), an ex-Sweetwater High player who once played for his dad, Tom Ritchey, the winningest coach in Mustang history and a member of the Big Country Hall of Fame.
Turns out the game was just as interesting.
Clyde dominated most of the first half and took a 13-0 lead before Sweetwater got untracked offensively. The Mustangs, who made their best offensive showing of the season, then scored the next 20 points only to see the Bulldogs strike back and ultimately send the game into overtime.
Sadly for Sweetwater, that was when everything turned into deja vu.
Clyde quarterback Lan-don Liles, who had let his workhorse running back Taylor Rogers shoulder most of the offensive burden up to that point, gave the Bulldogs the lead back by scoring on a 5-yard keeper to begin the overtime.
Clyde’s defense then took over, limiting the Mustangs to a net of two yards on two runs before two straight passes fell incomplete, the first one almost an inter-ception as well as a potential reception in the end zone.
When the second one also went incomplete, Clyde (3-1) had a 27-20 win over its former coach and Sweet-water (0-4) had its second overtime loss on the road in three weeks.
Despite the disparity in their records, the score is a pretty good reflection of how close in ability these two teams are.
Clyde has won its three games by a total of just 15 points, while being blown out 34-0 in its only loss against Graham in the Bulldogs’ home opener.
Sweetwater, meanwhile, has lost its three games by a total of just 27 points sandwiched around a lopsided 48-0 loss to Monahans.
“When we took the lead, I thought we’d stay hot and finish it out,” Slaughter said after the game. “But we couldn’t stop them. We’re still just a couple of plays away from getting a win.”
Most of Clyde’s offense prior to Liles’ winning touchdown came from Rogers, a 155-pound senior who ran 30 times for a game-high 219 yards and had scoring dashes of 15 and 44 yards.
But his first TD came after a muffed punt attempt allowed Clyde to start at the Sweetwater 16 and break a scoreless tie early in the second quarter, after the Mustangs had stopped two other promising drives deep into Sweetwater territory.
But after Clyde went up 13-0, Sweetwater finally got its offense cranking with new quarterback T.J. Jones at the controls.
Jones — called up from the JV just this past week — led a nine-play drive that resulted in an 8-yard scoring run by A.J. McCoy, who took a reverse handoff from teammate B.J. Walker and ran it in from the left side to cut the lead to 13-6.
After a pair of three-and-outs to start the second half, Jones went to the air to put Sweetwater on the board again. His completion over the middle to McCoy turned into a sensational 56-yard pass play that pulled the Mustangs within a point. Sweetwater then worked some trickery that paid off as it faked an extra point kick and Ken Norman threw a rollout pass to Walker for two points.
Suddenly, the visitors led 14-13 and the game was on.
Clyde, which had scored its second TD when Liles ran 20 yards on a fourth-and-2 quarterback keeper with 3:21 left in the first half to cap an 11-play drive, then drove to Sweetwater’s 12 but the Mustangs held on downs when a fourth-down pass to Jeremy Alcantar fell incomplete. A halfback op-tion pass was intercepted by Clyde after Sweetwater regained possession, but the Mustangs got another chance and took advantage.
After a personal foul penalty gave Sweetwater a first down, Walker ran 41 yards to Clyde’s 20. A personal foul on the Mustangs then pushed it back to the 36, but from there Jones threw his second touchdown pass, this time finding Walker for the score to make it 20-13 with 10:19 to play. The extra point kick was no good, but Sweetwater still appeared to have momentum on its side. That changed quickly when Clyde’s Rogers scored less than two minutes later on a 44-yard run and Justin Riley kicked the extra point to tie the game at 20.
Sweetwater was moving again, though, until Walker — who ran for a season-high 102 yards on 20 carries — was thrown for a two-yard loss on fourth-and-1 from Clyde’s 43 with under six minutes to play.
Rogers got 20 yards on three straight runs to set up Liles’ score in overtime after Sweetwater elected to let Snyder have the ball first.
The Mustangs will travel to Big Spring this Friday to wrap up non-district play.

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