(Abarw.com/Allison Weirich Photo) Liberty Hill JV defenders William Meng (12, making tackle) and Taylor Hall (65) helped the LHHS JV football squad sting Llano's Yellowjackets.
By Merle Bertrand, Sportswriter
Good parents always tell their kids to share. While the Liberty Hill JV Panthers probably listen to their parents off the football field, they were downright selfish towards the visiting Llano Yellow Jackets on Thursday night (Oct. 20). That’s because the Panthers hogged the ball for most of the night en route to a deceptively close 21-14 win at Panthers Stadium.
The stinginess started on the Panthers’ first possession, a 12-play, 73-yard drive that consumed 5:56 of the opening quarter. Nick Barrios pounded it in from the 3-yard line and Chris Robinson tacked on the extra point to stake the Panthers to a 7-0 lead.
The Panthers retained possession after the Jackets fumbled away the ensuing kickoff, but stalled. When Liberty Hill turned it over on downs, the Yellow Jackets finally ran their first offensive play of the game with 2:39 left in the quarter.
(Abarw.com/Allison Weirich Photo) Liberty Hill's Dakota Hall gets through the Llano offensive linemen and makes the tackle.
The Panthers defense quickly shut down Llano’s offense to give the right ball back to the offense. Just as they had done on the opening drive, the Panthers hogged the ball again for eleven time-consuming plays.
Unfortunately, back-to-back penalties stalled the drive and Llano took over on their own 35-yard line.
The Jackets came up with a huge 26-yard pass off a double reverse from wide receiver Oscar Chacon to Deven Mayne on a third and 23 to keep their drive alive. Three plays later, Tyler Stiles tossed a 39-yard touchdown pass to Carter Tasch to trim the lead to 7-6 at the half after the Panthers blocked the extra point.
Llano tried to emulate the Panthers, opening the second half with their own six-minute drive to Liberty Hill’s 38-yard line. A huge sack by Dylan Leisman helped the defense hold, however, and the Panthers took over on downs.
Barrios, Will Fromme and Bradley Noel took turns pounding it the other way before Noel punched it in from four-yards out on the first play of the fourth quarter to put the Panthers up 14-6.
With the defense playing solid football, Liberty Hill took a seemingly-safe 21-6 lead with 1:16 left in the game on Fromme’s 3-yard plunge and Robinson’s third conversion of the night.
Yet it took all of 15 seconds for Stiles to answer with a 65-yard bomb to Mayne. When they hooked up again on the conversion, the Panthers lead was a suddenly-precarious 21-14.
Fortunately for Liberty Hill, Noel recovered the onside kick to preserve the hard fought victory.
The Panthers ran some 55 plays to Llano’s 36 and held the ball for most of the night. The Panthers ground out a solid 274 yards overland in 49 carries, with Fromme (18 for 142, 1 TD), the workhorse.
More impressively for Liberty Hill, the Panthers defense held Llano to just 40 yards rushing on 23 attempts, although they gave up 173 yards through the air on big pass plays.
The JV Panthers host Lampasas Thursday night (Oct. 27) in their home finale.
