Friday the 13th at Womack Field didn’t see Jason Vorhees with a machete, but the No. 1 ranked Coffee County Trojans carved up the Statesboro Blue Devils thanks to over 250 yards rushing and a suffocating defense as they improve to 7-0 on the season while Statesboro falls to 2-5 and 1-1 in region play.
“We competed well for a little over a quarter,” said Statesboro coach Matt Dobson. “We missed some opportunities to keep it close and things got away from us. They are a good football team, but I really didn’t like the way we finished tonight.”
Coffee County wasted no time getting on the board as 5-10, 210-pound fullback Fred Brown went 53-yards on the Trojans first play from scrimmage for a 7-0 lead. The Statesboro offense was unable to get anything going, but the defense held Coffee on their next two possessions and they’d only lead 7-0 at the end of the first quarter.
On the Blue Devils first series of the second quarter, they would attempt a fake punt but had trouble on the snap and Coffee took over at midfield. They would come down the field and capped a six-play scoring drive with a 3-yard touchdown by Tyrese Hansley for a 14-0 lead.
Statesboro would be whistled for two personal fouls on the extra point and had a player ejected, allowing the Trojans to kick off from the Blue Devil 30-yard line. They would successfully recover an onside kick at the 19-yard line, and would score two plays later as Brown bounced off a couple tackles to make it 21-0. They’d tack on a 26-yard touchdown pass from Maurice Hansley to Range Robinson for a 28-0 halftime lead.
The second half didn’t get much better for the Blue Devils as Brown added his fourth touchdown run of the game. He would end the night with 129 yards rushing on 13 carries. Anthony Paulk added a 65-yard score, the Trojans then came up with a safety after a snap went over the head of punter Keith Howard and through the end zone. Paulk capped the scoring on the ensuing kickoff with a 61-yard touchdown for the final points of the game.
Despite being beaten 51-0 the Blue Devils still have a chance to make the state playoffs as they travel to 2-5 Bradwell next Friday which is something Dobson is trying to use to motivate the team to continue to fight.
“Part of coaching is being great motivators,” Dobson said. “Every coach on the staff has to do that with their players this week. We have to find a way to get the back focused on the task at hand which is to be one of the four teams from our region to advance to the postseason.”
