French Camp football coach Nathan Wright said he saw his team take it to the next level on Friday night against Vardaman.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to get the win as the Rams scored two second-half touchdowns and took a 14-10 win over the Panthers.
French Camp falls to 2-6 on the season and will take on Noxapater this week in a division 3-1A matchup.
Wright said his team played one of their better games of the year and were close to pulling off the upset on Friday night.
“We played a whole lot better and that was good to see but we just can’t get over the hump,” Wright said. “I thought we got after it and played with plenty of pop but just didn’t capitalize. Vardaman was able to put together a few good drives in the second half and we couldn’t get a stop when we needed one. I was nice to see our guys get after it and some guys who haven’t played well sort of figured it out and took it to the next level. I would love to have three or four plays back that would have made a difference. I’m proud of the effort of our boys because we played like a football team in my mind.”
The Panthers took the early lead as Ethan Wright scored on a 5-yard run in the first quarter. Reese Churchill hit the PAT and the Panthers led 7-0 in the first, a score that lasted until halftime.
Vardaman got back in the game in the second half. They scored first in the third on a 1-yard run and kicked the PAT to tie the game at 7-7.
But French Camp retook the lead with a 28-yard field field by Churchill to lead 10-7 going to the fourth
The Rams added a fourth-quarter score on a 1-yard run for the final margin of 14-10.
“I told them after that game that if we had played like that, we would only have two losses,” Wright said. “But you can’t go backward. That one hurt on Friday night. You could see that after the game in the locker room and that’s because we had some kids that played really hard. Everyone was let down, which you like to see because you know that they care. I just wished we had played with that kind of effort earlier in the season.”
Wright was 6-of-15 passing for 53 yards and he also rushed for 54 yards on 10 carries. Hodge had 52 yards on six carries. Avery Summers had three catches for 36 yards and three carries for 14 yards
“We had a couple of plays where we had guys wide open and missed them for different reasons,” Wright said. “Looking back on it, you would run the same play, you just hope they are looking for the ball when we are ready to throw it. It’s just a lot of growing pains and you would love to think that we are post them but we aren’t.”
Ethan Wright led the French Camp defense with 15 solo tackles and four assists for 19 total tackles. Hodge had 12 solo tackles and seven assists for 19 total tackles as well. J.D. Leach had four solo tackles and eight assists for 12 total tackles while Rylan Moore and Casen Shurden each had 11 tackles apiece. Benjamin Wright had seven tackles while Logan Wright and Aayden Ray had five tackles apiece. Avery Summers had four tackles while Max Bronson had three tackles.
“Defensively, I thought we did a lot of things well,” Wright said. “Vardaman runs a lot of different stuff and keeps you on your toes. But we had several kids step up this week which was good to see. We had guys in the right place which is always good. I thought the defensive line hit a level that they haven’t hit all year which was satisfying to see.”
