FOUNTAIN LAKE -- Fountain Lake struggled to connect in the championship game of the Allen Tillery Auto-Fountain Lake 7-on-7 Tournament as White Hall walked away with the 2019 trophy and a 21-9 win over the Cobras. Lake Hamilton took third with a 16-0 win over Pine Bluff in the consolation final.
The Cobras were 7-for-15 passing for 93 yards between their two quarterbacks in the game with rising junior Jack Wurz connecting on all three of his passes for 40 yards. Rising senior Ian Lacy was 4-for-12 passing for 53 yards.
After losing the coin toss and going on defense for the first series, the Cobras could not deny the Bulldogs on their first possession as they marched into the end zone on three passes. Lacy connected on just one pass in each of the Cobras next two possessions while Fountain Lake's defense stymied White Hall on its second possession.
"I thought we competed really well for this not being what we do offensively," said Fountain Lake head coach Brandon Barbaree. "It was really good to see the effort. We came out there and beat a Pine Bluff High team, competed real well against White Hall -- bigger schools that are going to be able to throw and catch the ball. Our guys just really competed well. I though our quarterbacks started making the right reads there at the end. I think we got better today."
White Hall's third possession came to a halt as Fountain Lake rising sophomore Gavin Nguyen picked off a pass to put the Cobras within 7-2. White Hall responded by scoring another touchdown, on two connections, for a 14-2 lead before Wurz quarterbacked the Cobras to their only touchdown of the game.
"We're still in the process of learning," said White Hall offensive coordinator Antonio Lovelady. "We made some early mistakes, but we bounced back. The quarterback (senior Gage Hollowell) bounced back well. I was proud of them. It's hard sometimes to throw an interception and then come back and throw a touchdown right after. I was proud of him for that."
Two connections later, the Bulldogs were up, 21-9, as they again found the end zone.
"We have a relatively young team, especially our receiver corps," Lovelady said. "On top of that, you throw a new system that they're learning. There's a lot of things we haven't installed yet, and they're executing the things that we have pretty well. With them being young, they're going to make some early mistakes, but the kids, they bounced back."
The new assistant coach said that with head coach Bobby Bolding's staff being in place for just a few months he is impressed with what the Bulldogs are already doing.
"With us just being there two and a half months, that's a great accomplishment," he said. "We put a lot of work in. We've changed a lot of things, and the kids have totally bought in. They're working hard, showing up every day at 6:30 (a.m.), so they're doing everything we ask of them."
While Barbaree has been at the helm of the Cobras since February, he does not want to say that he is comfortable with where the team is until after they are better tested.
"I'm not going to feel comfortable for a while, to be honest with you, because we've got a bunch of young ones who haven't made a bunch of plays in games," he said. "But these environments where you get a different environment than the practice field and then you get to sim against another school competing. I think that's when you're going to see that rise up to where we need to be. I thought I saw some kids compete and get better, and that's what we want to do, get better every day."
Rising junior Asa Westerman led the Cobras' receiving corps with four catches for 46 yards. Rising senior Brett Barbaree had one catch for 28 yards, rising junior Seth Hughes had one for 11.
Lake Hamilton also lost the toss, going on defense for its first possession, but the Wolves quickly made up for it, shutting down the Zebras' opening drive with just four yards gained. Rising junior quarterback Layne Warrick went 3 for 5 on the Wolves' first drive, connecting with rising sophomore Tevin Woodley for a two-yard touchdown.
"He's going to be good," Lake Hamilton head coach Tommy Gilleran said of Warrick. "He's got all the tools. When he got the read, he's got to make the throw. That's part of taking time and stuff. We do it in practice, but when you play against somebody real fast like Pine Bluff or White Hall, the spaces are closer and you've got to make the throws quicker. He learned that today. When we have ours in July, he'll be a little better prepared."
Rising senior Pearson Hafer picked off the Zebras' first pass of their second drive to make it 9-0 before Warrick connected with rising junior Cam'ron Rains and rising senior Alec Savage before finding rising senior Garrett Lynch on a four-yard touchdown pass to make it 16-0. Neither team found the end zone again before the clock expired.
"I thought we competed well, but there were times we didn't," Gilleran said. "Layne, this was his first year (to do 7-on-7). Last summer, he was hurt a lot, so we never got to do this. This was a big learning curve for him. He was under-throwing some balls and didn't see some reads.
"This was a good tune-up for him to get better. As he gets better, we'll get better. The good news with him, too, is if it's not there, he can run real fast. He gives us the ability to get out in the open with his feet. This was good for him to see, and our defense, we got a lot of new defensive kids. Our safeties are back, but both corners and linebackers are gone. ... We've got a lot of new kids, so we're trying to learn and get those together. It was good for us today.
"I thought we competed well. All the games were close, and we always had a chance to win. If we continue to do that, I think we'll have a chance to be successful this year."
Fountain Lake defeated Pine Bluff, 18-14, in the semifinals while Lake Hamilton fell to White Hall, 21-9. In the junior varsity bracket, Bryant defeated Lake Hamilton, 23-7, while Fountain Lake downed Pine Bluff, 9-7. Bryant defeated Fountain Lake in the JV championship, 18-0, and Lake Hamilton finished in third over Pine Bluff with a 16-9 win.
Barbaree was pleased with the tournament because it gave the teams a chance to line up against a different opponent than their teammates.
"Of course, we always want more schools, but the thing is just to have somebody else to go against," he said. "When you're not a huge school, it's hard to go up against yourself every day To get to see different formations and different concepts and different defenses, it really helps us. These are the kinds of days that we need. We got in five games. That's usually about what you get in a 7-on-7 tournament anyway, so it was really good for us.
"You bring down Pine Bluff High that's won multiple, multiple state championships, you've got White Hall that's got tremendous athletes. You get Lake Hamilton that has tradition, and they're going to have pretty good athletes. It was good for us to see different things. I thought our kids did a really good job."
Sports on 06/15/2019