Gonzales leads Hornets over Comets
■ The senior led Colcord to two touchdown drives in the fourth quarter.
COLCORD, Okla. — Blake Gonzales enjoyed celebrating his birthday on the football field Thursday night.
Gonzales, a Colcord (Okla.) senior running back, moved back to quarterback in the second half after an injury to starting quarterback Stormy Odle, and helped lead the Hornets on a pair of scoring drives to put away rival Kansas (Okla.) 30-12 in the South Delaware County Bowl at newly remodeled Hornet Stadium.
With the Hornets leading 16-12 in the fourth quarter, Gonzales threw a 61-yard touchdown pass to Aidan Parker with 6 minutes, 57 seconds left to give Colcord a 22-12 lead.
Then after the Comets lost their fifth fumble of the night on their next possession, Gonzales and the Hornets took advantage of a short field and he scored from eight yards out for a 28-12 lead. Gonzales then completed the two-point conversion pass to Tyler Duncan for a 30-12 lead and iced the Hornets’ seventh straight victory in the series.
“Amazing — I feel golden,” said Gonzales, while holding the rivalry trophy. “I couldn’t have done it without my team. It’s up to them. They’re my rock.”
Gonzales was originally penciled in to be the Hornets’ starting quarterback in preseason, but earlier last week coaches made the decision to go with the sophomore Odle at quarterback and move Gonzales back to running back.
“We’ve been using Blake and Stormy at quarterback,” Colcord coach Austin Martin said. “Blake
is just such a good running back we kind of switched them this week.
“When we told him, ‘Hey we’re going to move you this week from quarterback to running back,’ he was just like, ‘whatever’s best for the team.’ That’s the kind of kid he is.”
However, Odle went out with an injury the second half and Gonzales went back to the quarterback spot.
“You’ve got to step in and do what you do,” Gonzales said. “That’s why we practice. That’s why we go out to Rocky Top and work and work and work. We keep subbing in and out so we can have people ready for when that happens.” What is Rocky Top? “That’s our practice field,” Gonzales said with a grin. “We practice so hard on it that it turns into rock.”
The Hornets came up empty on their first drive in the fourth quarter, stalling out at the Kansas 31-yard line.
But after a defensive stand — one of many on the night for the Hornets — Colcord got the ball back at its own 39-yard line.
On the first play of the drive, Gonzales hit Parker over the middle and Parker raced 61 yards to the end zone for the score.
“When Blake came in, it just showed what kind of leader he is and what he wants to do for this team,” Martin said. “He’s just a good young man, hard worker. “
Gonzales finished with 142 rushing yards on 30 carries to lead Colcord, which finished with 185 rushing yards and 66 passing yards.
The Hornet defense held Kansas to six total yards of offense, including minus 26 in the running game.
“Defense played awesome,” Martin said. “We got the first score with the turnover on defense. I told them, ‘You keep playing hard and we’re going to get a score,’ and sure enough Dylan Davis picked it off and took it back. Our defense was good all night. Yeah we had some bad plays here and there, but the boys’ effort was unbelievable and I’m super proud of them.”
Part of the negative yards were fumbled snaps and botched plays for big losses, especially in the first half.
The Comets lost a fumble on the game’s opening kickoff but forced a Colcord fumble to get the ball back at the 10-yard line.
A Kansas fumble followed by a Colcord penalty put the ball at the 20, and Kansas’ William Hall carried for 15 and 5 yards to score with 9:24 left in the first quarter to put the Comets up 6-0.
Kansas recovered another Colcord fumble deep in its own territory in the first quarter, but this time the Comets gave it right back as Dylan Davis intercepted an Ethan Whaler pass and returned it 13 yards for a touchdown to put the Hornets on the board. Odle ran in the two-point conversion to give Colcord a 8-6 lead with 2:33 left in the first quarter.
Odle had a 23-yard touchdown run and Parker ran in the conversion with 2:03 left in the second as Colcord went up 16-6 at halftime.
Kansas came out rejuvenated in the third quarter, stopped Colcord on defense and got back in the game with a scoring drive.
Whaler hit Deaven Noe for a 32-yard pass, and Easton Wiggins ran in from 11 yards out with 8:52 remaining to cut the Colcord lead to 16-12.
“Kids played hard,” said Kansas coach Jimmy Dushane. “We had some mistakes there in the first half and we just challenged the kids to quit making mistakes. Mistakes hurt us. They capitalized on them and that’s because they’re a good football team. They’re well coached.”
A large crowd attended the game and Colcord was able to show off its new grandstand, scoreboard, stadium lights, concession stand and restrooms at Hornet Stadium. The home grandstand is comprised of the old visitor’s side bleachers at Glenn W. Black Stadium in Siloam Springs, while the light poles came from Gravette. Colcord athletics director Terrill Denny said the school district got help from numerous people in the Colcord community to complete the upgrades.
“First off I want to thank Mr. Bud Simmons, our superintendent; Terrill Denny our athletic director, and all our maintenance guys,” Martin said. “These past few weeks, they’ve been putting in 12- to 14-hour days. I think they stayed until 2 or 3 in the morning last night finishing up stuff. They love Colcord. They love all athletics and you can really tell from what they put into it.”