Rebels benefit from Rocket miscues

Published 1:29 pm Monday, September 8, 2008

By Charles Prince

The North Jefferson News



The visiting Vestavia Hills Rebels turned two Gardendale turnovers into nine points in an 83-second span to turn a 7-point lead into a 16-point cushion as they whipped Gardendale at Driver Stadium on Friday night, 29-13.

The Rebels led 7-0 with less than 30 seconds left in the first quarter, when a backward pass was bobbled by a Gardendale receviver and scooped up by Vestavia’s Grant Robinson at the Rocket’s 26-yard line.

Robinson dashed into the end zone to give the Rebels a two-touchdown lead.

Just 83 seconds later, a bad snap from center on a punt, led to a saftey when the Rocket’s punter couldn’t get out of the end zone after retriving the ball.

“We made a lot of mistakes tonight, on both sides of the ball,” Gardendale head coach Chris Fancher said. “It wasn’t just turnovers. We can’t line up illegally at receiver or move before the snap. That’s my fault. We’re either going to do one of two things. We’re either going to get better, or we’re going to replace people.”

Trailing, 22-0, the Rockets responded with a score on a double pass, following a Justin Houchins interception setting Gardendale up at the Vestavia 33-yard line.

Rocket quarterback Conner McCain took the snap and fired to his left in the backfield to receiver Bobby Williams, who turned and fired a long pass down the left sideline to Jacob Anderson. Anderson was more than 10 yards past any Vestavia defender and he carried the ball in with 1:47 left in the first half, cutting the lead to 16 points.

A try for a two-point conversion failed, so the Rockets were facing a 22-6 deficit at the half.

In the second half, they drove into Vestavia Hills territory on three occassions, but could only score once, on a 5-yard pass from Dallas Tidwell to Williams with just 1:19 left in the game.

The Rocket’s scoring march covered 80 yards in 16 plays.

“Dallas did some nice things on that drive and the kids never quit, they played hard the whole game, but we’ve still got to get better,” Fancher said. “Just playing hard isn’t good enough. We’ve got to eliminate mistakes and execute.”

The Rocket defense played well most of the game, led by senior linebacker Tyrone Bowie, who totaled 23 tackles—on 16 solo stops and seven assists.

Linebacker Earl Young added 14 tackles on 10 solo and four assists. Julius Shelton totaled nine stops.

Next week, the Rockets host Oak Mountain in their third region game in three starts.