Any coach will tell you that it is better to have an “ugly” win than a “pretty” loss and on Friday night at Chuckey-Doak that rang true for West Greene head man Evan Monroe after his squad earned a 27-13 win over their cross-county rivals.
Both teams were looking to bounce back after week two losses and get back into the win column, but neither team could get out of its own way, as they both would combine for 25 penalties that accounted for 229 yards.
In the end, West Greene would prevail picking up 17 first downs on 365 yards of offense, while holding Chuckey Doak to only eight first downs and 175 yards.
Monroe stated, “Any time that you get to beat a county rival, especially one that you have not beaten in a long time, it’s good. We got a little sloppy at times and got a lot of dumb things to cut out, but I am super proud of the way we played tonight.”
Friday’s win was West Greene’s first over the Black Knights since 2019.
For the first time in three weeks the Buffaloes got out to an early advantage behind two touchdown runs from Skyler Shelton, who finished the game with 88 yards on 22 carries. The first came when he broke through the line on a six-yard run with 4:07 on the clock. The PAT made the score 7-0.
Almost two minutes later, after recovering a Black Knight fumble, Shelton scampered 14 yards to pay dirt, making the score 13-0, after the extra point attempt was no good.
The Black Knights began to show some life in the second quarter when quarterback Dominique Atchison scrambled and went down the sidelines for a touchdown that covered 82 yards.
The extra point made the score 13-7 and gave some life to the home crowd.
Just as their opponents did earlier, the Black Knights put together a second scoring drive that began after recovering a Buffalo fumble. With 3:10 left in the half, it seemed that the West Greene defense had Gage Hill stopped as he took the handoff and went up the middle, but Hill used his athletic abilities to maintain his balance and take the rock to the house for a 17-yard score to tie the game up at 13-13.
Chuckey-Doak Billy Coach Kaylor said, “Both are very talented players, and we hit a little bit of a stride there, but we just couldn’t get out of our own way long-term.”
The second half belonged to the visitors from Mosheim. The Buffaloes gained the lead with 8:53 remaining in the third quarter when a snap went over the punter’s head and trickled through the back of the endzone, resulting in a safety.
From there it was all the Austin Brown show. Brown, a freshman making his first start at quarterback, completed 7-of-11 passes for 198 yards and two touchdowns, one to Austin Franklin that covered 69 yards and the other to Alex Johnson that went for 30 yards.
Monroe said he decided to give Brown the start based on intuition, and he was glad that he pulled the trigger on that decision.
“Brown is a kid with a lot of moxie. He came in, bought in, and studied the playbook, giving us an opportunity to get Franklin the ball out in open space and stretch the field a little more,” Monroe said.
West Greene, now 2-1 on the year and will host Eagleton Academy next week, for homecoming. Chuckey Doak falls to 1-2 and will travel to South Greene.
