Special to the Telegraph-Times-Monitor
The Keystone Heights Indians kept their perfect record intact on Oct. 8 with a five-touchdown victory over the Crescent City Raiders, resulting in a 56-21 win on homecoming.
Keystone entered its bye week with a 7-0 record and will return to action on Thursday, Oct. 21, at Pierson Taylor at 7 p.m.
Despite coming into the game with a high-powered offense capable of putting points on the board, Crescent City (3-3) was no match for the home side. The visitors fell behind 28-0 after just a quarter of play and were never able to recover.
Keystone won the toss and, as expected, elected to receiving the opening kickoff. The Raiders kicked deep, and Jeremy Miller returned it to the 34. The Indians then went on a 4:39-, eight-play drive, punctuated by a Dalton Hollingsworth 6-yard touchdown run. His attempt to run up the middle on the two-point conversion, however, was shut down. Still, with 7:21 remaining in the first quarter, the Tribe led 6-0.
Head Coach Chuck Dickinson makes no secret of the fact that he likes for his side to start out with the ball.
“We feel we want to take the opening drive and score to sort of set the tempo, and it also gives us a situation where we can see what their speed is.” He then added, “I’ve just always had that philosophy. I mean, everybody else wants to defer, which is fine with me.”
With the tempo having been set, Crescent City had a chance to answer, but things went poorly as soon as the offense took the field. On the opening play of the drive, quarterback Naykeem Scott lined up in the shotgun, and the snap nearly sailed over his head, but he was able to bring it back down, bobbling it into the arms. It didn’t matter as the play was halted due to a false start. On second down, the snap was high again. Only this time, it cleared Scott’s head and bounced all the way back to the Raider 12-yard line, where Keystone’s Trey Jeffries fell on the ball. On the very next play, Logan Williams scampered all 12 of those yards to paydirt to make it 12-0. Hollingsworth punched in for two afterward. Now, with two touchdowns just 10 seconds apart, the Indians led 14-0.
The snap woes continued for the Raiders on the ensuing drive, this time with yet another snap over the head on second down, which brought up a third-and-21 play. Scott was able to complete a pass, but only good enough for 5 yards. CCHS was forced into a punting situation for the first time on the night. The punt wasn’t to be, though, as Miller blocked it. The ball bounced out of bounds at the Raider 21-yard line.
The Indians’ drive again lasted just one play as Tyler Jenkins raced 29 yards for the score. Another Hollingsworth conversion made it 22-0 with 5:19 still to go in the first quarter.
On the ensuing drive, the Crescent City offense was finally able to get things going, picking up a first down and crossing midfield for the first time. However, a Scott deep pass to the end zone was overthrown, and Connor Guy came up with the interception, giving KHHS the ball back at its own 20-yard line.
While Keystone had make the last two drives look easy, scoring on just one play on each of them, this one looked as if it wouldn’t be much more difficult. Jenkins (who was crowned homecoming king the night before), was stopped for no gain on first down, but shot out of a cannon and exploded for a 77-yard touchdown on the following play. The score was immediately overturned due to a hold, which brought the ball all way back to the 35-yard line.
The three-headed attack of Williams, Hollingworth and Jenkins took over and began to eat up both ground and clock. The offensive line was putting in some serious work itself. On a third-and-1 play from the 11, Williams was able to follow a Luke Snider block and take it down to the 4 before Jenkins would find the end zone for the second time. The two-point conversion would fail, but it was Keystone Heights that led 28-0 as the first quarter clock read 0:00.
The Raiders came out with a new-found vigor in the second quarter and were able to finally sustain a scoring drive. On third down, Scott called his own number and ran 27 yards into Indian territory. A horse-collar penalty tacked on 15 yards, and suddenly CCHS was in the red zone. A jump pass from Scott would get his team down to a foot away from the promised land, but it would be a QB keeper on the next play that would get the visitors on the board.
Leading 28-7 early in the second, Keystone still had hopes of a running clock at halftime and wasted no time working toward that goal. Williams returned the kick to the 29, then exploded for a 56-yard run, which was also aided by a 5-yard facemask penalty. On the next play, it was Jackson Williams who would take it in from 15 yards out and then follow it up with a two-point conversion. Suddenly, it was 36-7.
If the Tribe wanted a running clock for the second half, Crescent City wasn’t making it easy for them as they again began to move the ball. This time, Jeffries came up with a big third-down sack. When the Raiders went for it on fourth down, the pass fell incomplete, and the Indians took over at their own 15, with a chance to hit that magical 35-point margin to have the clock run in the second half and make it an early night for everybody involved.
Jenkins opened things up with a 38-yard run to get Keystone into Raider territory. Three plays later, Logan Williams, who finished with 205 yards on 11 carries, had a 38-yard touchdown scamper. Hollingsworth was successful again on the two-point conversion to make it 44-7 with 4:46 to go in the half.
Crescent City still wasn’t ready to go away quietly, however, and after a fair-catch interference call gave the Raiders the ball at the Indian 40, the Raiders would drive all the way down to the 5 before a big third-down sack would bring up a fourth-and-goal. This was converted when Scott found a receiver in the corner of the end zone to again cut into the lead and make it 44-14 with 2:15 to go in the second quarter.
The Keystone offense isn’t really built for the two-minute drill, so it was beginning to look like it wouldn’t be until the second half that the Indians could force the mercy rule to be employed, resulting in a running clock. The Indians had other ideas, though. Jaden Goodman, the team’s only sophomore, pushed back two Raider defenders to open a big hole for Jenkins, which sprung him 15 yards. A pass-interference call followed, and suddenly KHHS was at the 12-yard line. Jenkins took it in from there, and the half would end with the home side up 50-14 and a clock that would run continuously in the second half.
“That is always big,” Dickinson said. “I even told the coaches in the game that if we didn’t get that last score in before half, I still wouldn’t feel comfortable. Once we got that in, I said now we relax a little, and once we get in the second half, we are just trying to play a lot of our kids and give them some experience so we can just get in and get out of here.”
Dickinson’s assessment wasn’t far off, as Crescent City opened the second half with a 55-yard touchdown pass to cut the lead to 50-21, but with the clock running, all of its hopes and dreams had already been all but crushed. The clock was already a minute into the half when that occurred and continuing to tick away.
Keystone answered with a touchdown drive of its own, capitalizing on a Jenkins score (his fourth of the night), and with 2:34 remaining, it was 56-21.
Jenkins rushed for 191 yards on 18 carries, while Hollingsworth added 87 yards on 13 carries.
Keystone rushed for 527 yards in all.
Clayton Kicklighter led the defense in tackles with nine, while Hollingsworth had six.
Dickinson seemed pleased with the result, saying, “Their quarterback is a heck of an athlete who can take it to the house anytime, so he worried me from that end as just being a player that can take over the game.”
When the Indians return to action, they’ll face a Pierson Taylor team that’s 2-3. The Wildcats, who are coming off a 28-21 loss to Interlachen, a team Keystone beat 44-0, will play Crescent City this Friday, Oct. 15.
One of the Wildcats’ wins was against Bell by a score of 23-20. Keystone played Bell also, winning 38-0.
“I haven’t seen them play,” Dickinson said. “I don’t get too far ahead because I do not want to get confused with what I’m going to do with this team (Crescent City).”
When asked if this could be the first team in Keystone history to win a playoff game, Dickinson stated, “That’s always been a goal for every team here. It’s one of those long-term goals, but our goal is one game at a time, and Peirson Taylor is next.” He then added, “Hopefully, we do get to the playoffs, and once we get there, hopefully we’ll be ready to go and take care of business.”
