Huge night for all three local teams, Steers win, Buffs win, and Bulldogs Win
Wow!!! What a night for our local football teams. All three of our teams won this Friday night dominantly. First, the Big Spring Steers opened district play against one of their main rivals in the Andrews Mustangs in Andrews and dominated them by a final score of 48-19. Next, the Forsan Buffaloes continued their perfect season, winning against Haskell 28-0. Finally, the Coahoma Bulldogs bounced back beautifully, winning over the Reagan County Owls 55-7. All three teams showed that they are in district football mode and played excellent football tonight.
We will start with the Big Spring Steers game and what a game it was for the Steers. The Steers were coming off a bye week in which they used that week to get healthy and mentally refreshed. They also had two weeks to prepare for the start of district play. They faced off against one of their main rivals, the Andrews Mustangs. The Mustangs have gotten the best of the Steers in recent years, which gave this year's Steers team even more motivation.
It was a great night for football; the weather was great, and the atmosphere in Andrews was even better. You could feel the fact that both teams wanted this game throughout the stadium. The Steers won the toss and differed until the second half letting the Andrews Mustangs take the field first. The Steers defense stepped up immediately, holding the Mustangs to a punt on the very first drive of the game. After the punt from Andrews, the Steers had their first shot with the ball. The Mustang's defense held firm and made the Steers turn over the ball on downs. Andrews now started their second drive of the game on their 25-yard line. Andrews started to move the ball down the field when the Steers defense stepped up and made their first big play of the game. Kaegan Mitchell made a fantastic interception and had a great return. The long interception return set the Steers up at their 11-yard line. The Steers scored the game's first touchdown when they ran an endaround pass play in which Eli Cobos threw a touchdown pass to Kavien Ford from six yards away. Cobos then kicked the extra point making this a 7-0 lead for the Steers with 5:40 left in the first quarter. The Mustangs answered right back when they scored on a 34-yard pass on a nice screen play. However, they missed the extra point making this a 6-7 game for the Steers. That was how this first quarter ended, with the steers clinging to a one-point lead.
In the second quarter, the Steers scored very quickly when Gabriel Baeza hooked up with Devin Manning for a 42-yard touchdown pass. Cobos kicked the extra point giving the Steers a 14 to 6 lead. So, with 11:37 left in the second quarter, the Steers were back in the lead. Andrews then answered with an excellent defensive play of their own when they caused a Steers fumble and returned it 80 yards for a touchdown. The Mustangs then decided to go for the two-point conversion to tie up the game. The Steers' defense stood firm, keeping the Mustangs out of the endzone, making the score 12 to 14 with 6:23 left in the first half of play. Andrews then scored another touchdown on a nine-yard run making this a 19 to 14 game in favor of the Mustangs with only 2:42 left in the half. The first half ended with a huge defensive stand from the Steers, and The Andrews Mustangs were going in to score another touchdown with only five seconds left in the second quarter. Still, the Steers stood firm, keeping them out of the endzone and keeping this at a 14 to 19 game at halftime. Trailing in a rivalry game on the road, the Steers knew it was time to take control of this game. Since the Steers differed until the second half, they received the second-half kickoff. The Steers' offense came out of the locker room clicking. They took the first drive of the second half down the field with ease. They capped off the drove with a 34-yard touchdown pass from Baeza to Eli Cobos. After Cobos put the extra point through the uprights, the Steers had the lead back at 21-19. This was a huge second half of football after that touchdown. The Steers's defense played lights out and didn't allow another point. The offense went on to put up 27 more points in te half. Completely dominating the Andrews Mustangs. The Steers went on to win this game, going away 48 -19.
The win is huge for the Steers. Not only did they dominate one of their biggest rivals, but they are also now 1-0 in District play and now 6-2 on the season. Whn this team is clicking like they were tonight, they are a hard team to beat. When Baeza is 100% healthy, this team is by far the best in the district, and they shoed that tonight.
Next up, we have the Forsan Buffaloes. What can I say about the Forsan Buffs I haven't said before? They are one of the best teams I have ever been able to wtch. They are utterly dominant on both sides of the ball. They came into Friday night's game with a perfect record of 7-0. They were taking on a frankly overmatched team in Haskell. Like all their other games this season, they dominated Haskell, winning easily 28-0. I haven't got stats for this game yet, so I can't do a complete breakdown, but I can tell you this team is flat-out dominant without looking at the stat sheet. After next week, they should go 9-0 and set up a massive game on their home field for the district title against Hawley. I have said it multiple times. This team is something special what we see from the Forsan Buffs is astonishing.
Like the Forsan game, I have not got full stats on the Coahoma game. But I know they dominated the Reagan County Owls tonight 55-7. This was a huge bounce-back game for the Bulldogs as they are now right into the playoff picture.
I will have more on both Forsan and Coahoma in the Monday edition of sports. We should get the article over Coahoma written by the great Steve Belvin that I will include on the Saturday page. He has done a great job of covering the Bulldogs all season long, and I want to give him a big thank you for all that he does.
Once again, this was an excellent night for the three local teams in this area. They all dominated in their games and represented this area to the best of their ability. Next week will be another great week of football, as now all these teams are squarely in the playoff race.