Last week, Newton County lost in the last minutes of the game against Mize.
This week, the Cougars took care of business early as they ran out to an early lead and cruised to a dominating 39-6 win over Northeast Lauderdale.
Newton County improves to 3-3 on the season and will play at rival West Lauderdale on Friday.
Newton County coach Bobby Bass said he challenged his players to be physical against the Trojans, and he got what wanted.
“I challenged our kids to come out and be really physical,” Bass said. “They were really scary on film. Our physicality has been really good the last few weeks, and our kids are playing hard. I’m just really proud of them. They just keep fighting. We wanted to jump out early and did that.
The Cougars got the ball to start the game and went to work on offense. They went 55 yards in five plays and scored on a 35-yard pass from Tali King to Byron Pruitt with 9:51 left in the first. Myles Mangum hit the PAT and County led 7-0.
After Northeast turned the ball over on downs, County found the end zone again as Cam Bell scored on a 30-yard run with 3:24 left in the first. Mangum’s PAT was good and County led 14-0.
The scored stayed there until late in the second quarter when County scored on a 7-yard run by Juan Brown. The try for two failed and County led 20-0.
The Cougars forced a quick three and out and then hit a 72-yard pass from King to Pruitt in the last seconds of the half. The try for two failed and County led 26-0 at the half.
“Up front, they did some things where they sent everybody and that gives you some problems,” Bass said. “But we handled that for the most part. We were able to hit some big plays in the passing game. I think the biggest turning point of the game was we scored late in the second quarter and then scored right before the half on a big pass and that really took the wind out of their sails. I thought that was really big, scoring twice there before the half.”
Pruitt helped the Cougars put the game away in the third when he intercepted a Northeast pass and returned it to their 15. Two plays later, King hit Bell on a 13-yard touchdown pass. Mangum’s PAT gave County a 33-0 lead.
Northeast then put together a 20-play drive but had to settle for a field goal. County’s Jacob Gilbert blocked the field goal attempt and Bell returned it 73 yards for a touchdown for a 39-0 lead.
Northeast added a late score for the final of 39-6.
On offense, the Cougars had 167 yards passing and 161 yards rushing for 328 yards of total offense.
King was 6-of-9 passing for 167 yards with three TDs while Pruitt had two catches for 104 yards and two TDs. Brown had 67 yards rushing on 13 carries with one touchdown, while Myles Mangum had 46 yards rushing seven carries.
On defense, Brown led the Cougars with 13 tackles while Jacob Gilbert had 120 tackles. Kaleb Webster had eight tackles while Kaleb Davis had seven stops. Pruitt had six tackles and an interception while Harrison Chaney had five stops. Peyton Hardy, Bell, Emmanuel Thaggard and Grant Keith each had four tackles apiece.
