By James Beach
Correspondent
It is not often that a football team churns out a precision-like 524 yards of offense, holds the opposing offense to a mere 84 total yards and watches the scoreboard tell a 41-3 story only to have its head coach point out the one battle his squad lost.
“I told our kids at halftime, we got outplayed and outhustled, and if it weren’t for our talent, we’d have been in a predicament,” Tyner coach Wayne Turner said after Friday night’s victory over East Hamilton at Finley Stadium.
“You would like to see your team take two steps forward and then add another step instead of taking a step backwards, but we’re not there yet,” Turner added. “Instead of us playing consistent, we seem to find ways to play down to our opponent’s level. East Hamilton played really hard tonight and showed a tremendous amount of effort, especially in the first half.”
Tyner (3-2) led just 21-3 at the break, and with Hurricanes linebacker Chad Patterson dishing out punishment on every snap, it seemed, coach Ted Gatewood’s squad appeared to be in it for the long run. But the Rams had too many playmakers and the Hurricanes not enough Pattersons.
Rams quarterback Travis Jones was deadly, completing all but one of his 13 passes for 212 yards (with TD tosses of 38 and 12) and rushing for 69 on 10 carries. Tyner ran the ball 42 times for 312 yards as 13 Rams rushed the ball.
Dameian Suttles led the Tyner receivers with three catches for 69 yards and scored on a 2-yard burst. Julian Stubbs was the leading rusher for the Rams, dashing 88 yards on his lone carry for Tyner’s final score.
“I was proud of our effort right up until the fourth quarter,” Gatewood said. “Tyner just has too many weapons and they took us out of our game completely. We couldn’t run the ball.”
Tyner allowed 84 yards rushing and for the second week in a row held its opponent to one completion. Cornerback Sean Neal had an interception and broke up three passes. End Kevin Dossett returned from an injured ankle that kept him inactive last week and had several tackles for losses and a sack and partially blocked a punt to set up Tyner’s second score.
Bobby Hendricks had two TD runs for Tyner, which will be off next week. East Hamilton avoided the shutout thanks to Logan Cornelius’ foot, knocking in a 34-yard field goal. The Hurricanes (1-3) were held to two first downs and 27 yards of offense the final half.
Contact James Beach at sports@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6273.