Owensboro was clicking on all cylinders on Friday night, playing its most complete game of the season to come away with a dominant 56-7 win over Graves County to stay undefeated in district play.
The Eagles opened the contest up on offense, slowly marching their way up the field via the ground game. Facing third and seven, senior Jeremiah Goodwin got a huge five-yard tackle for a loss and forced Graves County to go for it on fourth and 12.
Fellow senior Xander Early got a sack the next play for a turnover on downs, quickly setting up the Red Devils to take control of the game early. Senior Kenyatta Carbon proceeded to explode out of the backfield on the very first play of the drive for Owensboro, stiff-arming a defender en route to a 44-yard gain.
The Red Devils were at the 24 as a result, making it first and goal a few plays later. The Eagles nearly stuffed Owensboro by forcing fourth and three, but Carbon took the handoff into the endzone with a defender draped all over him to take a 7-0 lead with 2:48 left in the first quarter.
Owensboro’s defense didn’t let up on the next two drives, silencing the Eagles and getting going offensively again shortly into the second. This time Carbon set up the offense with a 39-yard carry, which Early capped off with a five-yard carry by Early to lead 14-0 with 10:42 left in the first half.
Carbon fittingly put his jersey number up on the scoreboard on the following offensive drive for the Red Devils, taking a handoff 65 yards for a touchdown and a 21-0 lead with 8:30 left in the second quarter. Owensboro went on to force another Graves County punt, which the punter was only able to send five yards before the Red Devils fell on it at the 26.
After a short run for sophomore Deion Winstead, senior Khalil Rogers caught a screen pass and took it 24 yards for a touchdown and the 28-0 lead with. Owensboro got it back quickly with another defensive stand, but senior quarterback Kasey Boone threw an interception on first down deep downfield.
However, roughing the passer was called and the Red Devils retained possession and had a first down at the 34 with 2:30 left in the second quarter. A few flags and a couple plays later, freshman Evan Hampton took a 13-yard carry into the endzone.
This was followed by a two-point conversion with Boone running it in for the score himself, building Owensboro’s lead to 36-0 and starting the running clock going into halftime.
The Red Devils picked up right where they left off to start the second half, as junior Javion Robinson took the opening kickoff about 50 yards for a touchdown and a 43-0 to start the third quarter. A few plays later Goodwin forced a fumble, which Rogers recovered and took for the touchdown to take a 50-0 lead with 6:33 left in the quarter.
The starters came out of the game for the night following the drive, as Owensboro surrendered a touchdown and a pick in the remainder of the game. Evan Hampton gave the Red Devils one last score with a minute to go, taking a handoff 63 yards to put the finishing touches on a 56-7 district win.
Carbon led the way offensively out of the backfield, rushing 164 yards and two touchdowns on eight carries. These sorts of impressive numbers have come somewhat expected of the senior back every single week, as he continues to succeed using his athleticism as well as strong play from his offensive line.
“You can’t give him the ball very many times because we score so fast and that’s a good problem to have,” Head Coach Jay Fallin said. “He’s just a really explosive player that has a lot of gifts. He’s got tremendous vision, he’s strong and he runs much bigger than he is. He’s hard to tackle.”
As Fallin previously mentioned in regards to his line, he felt as though the offense as a whole played very well from top to bottom. He was especially pleased with the team’s ability to limit silly penalties that could’ve cost them.
“Kenyatta is explosive and the offensive line was doing a nice job,” Fallin said. “Khalil had a great catch and run, Ethan had some nice catches and Kasey made some great decisions and did some great things with the ball. We were only penalized one time in the first half when the starters were in there. We just played a good, clean game.”
Up to this point in the season, Fallin and the Red Devils felt like they had been searching for how to replicate their best performance of the season—the opener against St. X. After battling injuries with key players for weeks, especially on the defensive end, Owensboro was able to get some of those key players back to make a huge difference and reach that goal.
“Getting those guys back [was big],” Fallin said. “Defensively I thought we couldn’t play any better. Special teams I thought we played well and executed well… Just proud of how we played start to finish. I’m proud of the focus our guys have brought these last two weeks.”
Fallin said that putting together this complete game was a huge boost for the team, letting them put away any doubts they or others in the community might have had following a tough loss to Owensboro Catholic in early September.
“This is just one game,” Fallin said. “It shows our guys again that we are a good team. I think there was probably a lot of doubt and a lot of people maybe questioned us and wrote us off after the Catholic loss. But I think we’re firing on all cylinders now and we have to carry that forward.”
Now the key to Owensboro sustaining success is not thinking that they automatically have everything figured out with this one game. Fallin said that they’ve preached humility as of late, expressing to his team that wins don’t just come to the program.
In order to continue to come away with wins week after week, Fallin said they have to remain focused in everything they do. That starts with their time off the field, now having a week to prepare for another district bout with Grayson County at 7 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 21.
“We have to continue to be humble and continue to make sure we’re doing things the right way,” Fallin said. “‘No stone unturned’ was our motto all week. We leave no stone unturned in our preparation and that’s everything from how we take care of ourselves physically, how much film we’re watching, how much we’re studying the scouting report, how hard we’re working in practice and how we’re getting treatment when we’re injured. Everything… At best we have seven weeks of the season left and that’s if we’re playing in the State Championship game. We gotta maintain that every week from here on out.”
