First-year Newton football coach Zach Grady was expecting senior Tre Hillie to have a standout season from the quarterback position.
But two games into the season and Hillie has taken only one snap at quarterback, which was on a fake punt.
Eupora took full advantage of that as the Eagles ran out to a big lead and cruised to a 34-18 win over the home-standing Tigers on Friday night.
Despite the defeat at the hands of a more physical defense, first year head coach Zach Grady remains optimistic about his Tigers because talented young players are taking valuable snaps and gaining experience.
“We’ve got to continue to get better, continue to regroup,” Grady said. “Having our starting quarterback would help tremendously. Tre (Hillie) is out and that’s a setback for us right now. Until we get him back, we are kind of hit and miss back there, but we are getting some valuable reps at that position. We’ve just got to continue to play hard until we can get him back.”
On the defensive side of the ball, Grady is singing the same song, second verse.
“We are still very young,” Grady said. “We’re still learning the schemes and getting valuable reps in key places. We just got to keep playing. You can only be young for a couple of games, and after that you’re old so you got to play.”
A very physical Eupora team led by quarterback Edwin Herard and running back Abraham Hodges took advantage of the Tigers in the opening drive of the game, scoring in less than three minutes. Moving the ball 60 yards down the field, Hodges broke out for some double digit runs and Herard capped the drive off with a 17-yard pass to Cameron Culpepper to take a 7-0 lead.
The Tigers looked to have an answer when Lawrence Morris completed a 30-yard pass to Desmond Moore into the red zone, but it was called back on a holding penalty.
Preston Perkins put Eupora up 15-0 on a 2-yard run after the Eagles faked the PAT attempt with a pass play.
Following a Newton fumble at midfield, Eupora’s Travon MacMillan scored to give the Eagles a commanding 21-0 lead at the end of the first quarter.
This is one of the points where Grady saw glimmers of positive things to come. The Tigers recovered a fumble on the Eupora 49-yard line. Two plays later, Hillie took a handoff, reversed direction and scampered 25 yards for a touchdown to put Newton on the board at 21-6.
“They just continued to play hard,” Grady said. “They didn’t get down and give up. They kept fighting back.”
Eupora closed out the half on a Herard-to-Culpepper pass play for 28 yards and a touchdown, giving them a 27-6 lead.
Newton made its final bid to get back into the game late in the fourth with a relentless running attack and a 28-yard pass play from Lawrence Morris to Tyshun Evans. The play set up Desmond Moore for the 1-yard run with 9:42 left in the game, cutting the advantage to 27-12.
Eupora answered with a 16-yard touchdown run by Perkins, extending the lead back to 34-12.
With less than a minute left, Jykail White added a 2-yard run to make the final score 34-18 in the Eagles favor.
On the night, White carried the ball for 91 yards on 22 carries leading all rushers. The injured Hillie contributed a touchdown and 54 yards on three carries.
