Red Devils rally to hand Marion first win (With Gallery)
Aug. 23—oak hill — They took a little while to launch, but the Oak Hill Red Devils rode a late surge to hand first-year head coach Davon Marion an exciting victory Friday in his initial game at the helm.
Before rallying to nail down a 14-10 conquest of visiting Nicholas County, the Red Devils found themselves trailing at halftime 3-0 and staring at a 10-0 deficit midway through the third period at John P. Duda Stadium. The Grizzlies converted a Johan Villasenor defensive fumble recovery into a scoring drive capped by Coltin Browning's 39-yard gallop to the end zone with 6:11 remaining in the third, and Villasenor's kick pushed the visitors' lead to 10-0.
"At halftime was the key," said Marion, the former Mount Hope and Concord standout who coached in Princeton for several years before moving into the OHHS head spot in the offseason.
"We calmed everybody down, you know, first-game jitters. We just wasn't executing in the red zone in the first half and we made a few adjustments and just talked to the kids about playing together. Like don't worry about the score, don't worry about what's going on, just play together and we'll win this game.
"And even going down 10-0, we could have easily gave up, but our guys, you know, they turned it up a little bit and that's what I wanted to see. I wanted to see guys play with heart and way more energy. We lined up and we ran the ball and after we were successful for a few plays, it was like, 'We can just do this all the way down the field,' and that's what we done."
The Red Devils quickly responded to Browning's TD and kept the game from getting away from them. With solid line play and strong running from both J.D. Mauritz and James Green — along with a key 15-yard burst from Tyler Ashmore late in the drive — Oak Hill eventually found paydirt on Green's 5-yard scamper, and Jackson Pino's PAT kick trimmed the deficit to three, 10-7.
On the next Nicholas County march, the Grizzlies advanced to the Red Devil 19, but a Colton Naylor sack and a David Spaulding interception in the end zone on back-to-back plays thwarted the threat and gave the Red Devils life.
Much to the delight of the home crowd, they took advantage, as Mauritz ripped off a 21-yard run to get the ensuing possession started. NCHS had the first of three encroachment calls on the drive, and Mauritz then tacked on a second-effort 8-yarder. Later, Green raced 21 yards down the Red Devil sideline to give the hosts a first-and-goal situation at the 4. Mauritz bulled over the goal line two plays later and, Pino's kick allowed Oak Hill to escape with the 14-10 victory.
On the night, Mauritz rambled for 88 yards, including the go-ahead touchdown, on 17 carries, and Green amassed 75 yards and a six-pointer on 12 tries. Reserve quarterback Levi Kiszka was 6-of-8 for 114 yards.
Browning gained 65 yards and a TD on 16 carries for the Grizzlies, and quarterback Coleton Hellems was 11-of-16 for 113 yards.
"We made a few mistakes and hurt ourselves, but young football teams are going to do that," said Nicholas County head coach Gene Morris. "I'll tell ya, they've got a very good football team, Oak Hill does. Take nothing away from them. They ran the ball effectively; they've got a nice, big running back. They were able to keep the chains moving and we just didn't have quite the size to match 'em up right then, but that's OK.
"We're learning and our effort tonight was outstanding. I thought we gritted it out and played for four quarters, you know, and we didn't back down from anything. They just played as hard as they can play. They gave us everything they had. If we do that every Friday night, then we're gonna be OK."
Marion paused afterwards to embrace the significance of the victory for himself.
"It means a lot, honestly," he said. "I've been a football guy since I was four years old and once I got to the point where I realized I can't play anymore and jumped into coaching, I've always wanted to be a head coach and I've learned a lot as an assistant at Princeton from my coaching buddy and great friend, Coach (Chris) Pedigo. He showed me a lot of things and I've implemented them in our program, and this is what I've always wanted to do so I'm just excited and I'm happy for a chance."
"We kept the chains moving on that last drive," Morris said. "We made some youthful mistakes. It just happens to be one of those things when you're so amped up that you want to get in there and to do something and you want to play so hard and help your buddies out that you forget the key thing and that's to keep the football.
"I've told 'em before we're going to live with our mistakes. We're going to live with them. We've got growing pains to go through. We're going to get better. We've just got to be smarter the next time we go out. Hopefully we'll improve and we'll play a little cleaner football as far as the mistakes go. Again, we're a little bit young and we got a little anxious out there.
"You put freshmen and sophomores out there and sometimes these things happen. I'm gonna live with them, and like I told 'em, you just keep going, you just keep being aggressive, you just keep doing your thing, calm down and it'll get a little easier. The game will start slowing down for you. Right now it's so fast for these young guys, that it's comin' 90 miles an hour and that's OK and they'll get a little better next Friday night and so on and so forth."
The Grizzlies got the lone score of the first half on a 37-yard field goal from Villasenor with 59.7 seconds left in the first quarter. The Nicholas tally occurred after the Red Devils eschewed a punt on fourth-and-5 from their own 47 and saw a fourth-down run by Malachi Lewis stuffed up the middle.
Riding the passing arm of Kiszka, the Red Devils approached the red zone on two of their final three drives of the opening half. However, both times the hosts turned it over on downs on incompletions.
Oak Hill (1-0) hosts Independence at 7 p.m. next Friday.
"It gets harder," said Marion. "Independence and then Princeton. We seen what Princeton done to them on the scrimmage and Independence is the defending AA state champs. We know we got our work cut out and, like I told 'em, I'm going to celebrate for three more hours and move on to Independence, so don't get satisfied.
"I felt like we got satisfied in our scrimmage games. After beating Spring Valley, we came out flat against Mingo, and we can't have that next week. They're a really good football team and an excellent coach, so it's just onto next week for these guys and that's part of turning this program around is realizing one win means nothing. We got a long way to go and that's what we plan to do."
"I'm really proud of my team," Morris said. "I thought they played their butts off. I think we were a little bit overmatched, but I thought we played pretty well. They're hard to move up front, they're big.
"Our kids gritted it out. A lot of times they were driving and we were able to stop it, slow it down. Sometimes you just have to gamble and send the house."
Nicholas County (0-1) visits Shady Spring next Friday, also at 7 p.m.
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NC (0-1) 3 0 7 0 — 10
OH (1-0) 0 0 7 7 — 14
First quarter
NC: Johan Villasenor 37 FG, 0:59.7
Third quarter
NC: Coltin Browning 39 run (Villasenor kick), 6:11
OH: James Green 5 run (Jackson Pino kick), 1:00
Fourth quarter
OH: J.D. Mauritz 2 run (Pino kick), 3:29
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
RUSHING — NC: Coltin Browning 16-65-1, Coleton Hellems 6-(-3), Devin Nash 2-3, Lucas Milam 3-18, Jaxson Morriston 2-17, Team 1-(-6). OH: J.D. Mauritz 17-88-1, Malachi Lewis 7-13, James Green 12-75-1, Levi Kiszka 2-6, Mikey Spack 1-6, Tyler Ashmore 1-15, Team 1-(-1).
PASSING — NC: Coleton Hellems 11-16-2-113-0; OH: Malachi Lewis 3-7-0-25-0, Levi Kiszka 6-8-0-114-0
RECEIVING — NC: Kage Hayhurst 3-42, Lucas Milam 2-13, Grayson Kesterson 3-35, Colton Burkhammer 1-15, Coltin Browning 2-8; OH: Carson Treadway 1-35, Zychaeus Lewis 1-41, David Spaulding 2-14, James Green 1-10, Armonyi Hicks 2-33.
TAKEAWAYS — NC: Johan Villasenor (FR); OH: Malachi Lewis (INT), David Spaulding (INT).
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