In one quarter of action the Fulton Falcons were unable to put points on the board after giving up a quick touchdown to the Halls Red Devils. The Red Devils went on offense first and drove the ball downfield without throwing a pass. The offensive line for Halls opened up big holes for the ballcarriers. Halls scored its touchdown on nice run with 9:45 left in the contest.
The successful PAT made it 7-0.
Fulton's only real offensive drive did manage to produce a couple of first downs. Quarterback Ben Winters attempted a couple of unsuccessful deep passes to wide receiver Micah Pitchford but basically the Falcons kept it on the ground. Winters did his Tim Tebow impression on one play, picking up a few yards. Also carrying the ball were tailbacks Marco Golliday and Dametrius Thomas, who had a couple of nice runs. Eventually, however, the Halls defense forced the Falcons to punt the ball away.
On the Halls' next possession the Falcon defense adjusted to the fact that Halls wasn't going to throw the ball and put eight men in the box, which effectively slowed the Red Devils down. Faced with 3rd-and-long, the Red Devils finally did go to the air which almost resulted in a quarterback sack by Fulton. But the Halls quarterback did get the pass off and the Falcons secondary was flagged for defensive holding. So instead of forcing a punt and getting another shot on offense the Falcons gave new life to Halls drive.
Even though the penalty yardage did not give Halls an automatic first down it did put them close enough so that a short burst up the middle was enough to move the sticks again. After this Halls just continued to drain the clock with running plays that were just effective enough to keep it going. With about 15 seconds left to go the Halls runner broke through the line and made Falcon Jemichael Williams miss him...but then Williams managed to get up, go after the ballcarrier and strip him of the ball!
Fulton recovered the Halls fumble with 11 seconds left. The Falcons attempted a couple of halfback passes that fell short as time ran out. Thus the Halls strategy of scoring early and then shortening the game with a punishing ground game proved to be the winning one.
It's hard to tell much from just 12 minutes of game time but I definitely see the opening by which Hickory can exploit the inexperience of the Falcons on Friday night.
If you can't be there in person make sure you go to WKCS 91.1 FM and listen to the scrimmage live. Again, I would tune in about 6:00 PM to be sure you don't miss anything. Expect to hear music playing until the broadcast team goes on the air.
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