Union football coach Brad Breland said he Yellowjackets didn’t play bad against Scott Central on Friday night.
They just didn’t play good enough to win.
The Rebels jumped out to a 14-0 lead and used a rugged rushing attack to take a 27-16 win over the Yellowjackets on Friday night.
With the loss, Union falls to 6-2 and 1-1 in Division 5-2A play while Scott Central improves to 7-2 on the year. Union will travel to rival Lake on Friday night in another 5-2A contest.
Breland thought his team played hard but just didn’t make enough plays to beat the Rebels.
“I thought we played really hard,” Breland said. “We played hard and we competed hard, we just didn’t execute very well on offense. It was several things. It might have been the back hitting the wrong hole or blocking the wrong player. We just shot ourselves in the foot all night.”
Scott Central got on the board first as they punched in a score late in the first quarter as Treyon Wash scored on a 2-yard run. The PAT was good and Scott Central led 7-0 with 2:51 left in the first quarter.
The Rebels added to their lead just a few minutes later as Lajavis Patrick scored on a 10-yard run with 11:04 left in the second quarter for a 14-0 lead.
The Yellowjackets were able to score late when Colby Ferguson hit Jamarian Harmon on an 8-yard touchdown pass with one second left in the first half. Ferguson ran in the two-point conversion as Union cut the lead to 14-8 at the half.
“I thought we played well on defense for the most part, we just gave up four or five back-breaking plays,” Breland said. “We had them third and 30 and gave up a 60-yard play on a hitch. We had them pinned deep once and gave up a first down when we lost containment. My hats off to them, they made the plays. Regardless of how hard we played and how much we put into it, you have to make plays when you get the chance. They made their plays and we didn’t and the was the difference in the game.”
In the second half, both teams went scoreless in the third quarter and Scott Central struck first as Elijah Robinson scored on a 1-yard run for the Rebels. The PAT was good and Scott Central led 21-8.
Union answered right back with its second touchdown of the game as Ferguson hit Harmon on a 12-yard touchdown pass with 9:28 left in the game. Ferguson ran in the two-point conversion and Union cut the lead to 21-16.
That was as close as Union got as Scott Central finished out the game with a 6-yard touchdown run by Wash with 1:11 left to play for the final margin of 27-16.
“Offensively, we didn’t block as well as we needed to,” Breland said. “We didn’t block the right people and didn’t move people. We had false starts and snap infractions. It just wasn’t a good game for the offensive line at all. We expect more out of them and I feel like they expect more of themselves. We talked about it after the game, we can’t sit there and dwell on it and get ready to play a tough Lake team. That’s our No. 1 focus.”
Union had 215 yards of total offense with 77 passing and 138 rushing. Ferguson was 6-of-13 passing for 77 yards. Buckley led the rushing attack with 76 yards on 17 carries. Markus Jones had 49 yards receiving on three catches while Harmon had two catches for 20 yards and two TDs.
Scott Central had 359 yards of offense with 259 rushing and 100 passing. Wash was 3-of-9 passing for 100 yards and rushed for 114 yards on 17 carries. Patrick had 91 yards rushing on nine carries.
Peyton Posey led the defense with 1.5 tackles with nine solo stops. Keyon Clay had six tackles while Carlos Hickmon, William Hughlett and Jones each had four tackles.
