Maryville Drops Cherokees To Claim (Another) Region Title

Rebels Runs Region Win Streak To 136 Games Despite Hunt’s 228-yard Effort

  • Saturday, October 24, 2020
  • James Beach

ATHENS, Tenn. – Maryville had seen the impressive scoring numbers and heard the pregame chatter leading into Friday night’s massive Region 2-6A battle with fourth-ranked McMinn County, and while it wouldn’t be quite honest to say they didn’t pay any attention to it, in the end it was merely another region football game for the 17-time Tennessee state champs.

And when it comes to region games, well, let’s just say the state’s premier football program has long since paid off the mortgage and pretty much owns them lock, key and front door.

The second-ranked Rebels did something no one else has done this season in shutting down McMinn County’s pinball offense and in turn made sure the host Cherokees didn’t do something no one has done the last 20 years: notch a region win against boys in white.

Maryville (9-0, 5-0) won its 136th consecutive region battle by holding a McMinn County team averaging 48 points a contest to a meaningless fourth-quarter safety in another 21-2 thumping before an overflow Cherokee crowd.

“When I played here and later coached with Coach (George) Quarles he never once mentioned anything about streaks to us as players or as coaches.

It’s just not something we concern ourselves with. We show up to play football games on Friday nights, and our goal is to win them, and move on to the next one. We just want to win the week. Tonight was a good win against a really impressive team,” said Maryville boss Derek Hunt, who play quarterback for the Rebels during the impressive streak and was an assistant before taking over as the head coach four years ago.

Of course, when an obstacle the size of this McMinn County (8-0, 4-1) in the way it wouldn’t be quite fair to just call it another game, especially with the buzz surrounding the game and the chatter of an upset making its way above a whisper.

“Yeah, we heard all the talk this week, but in the end who beat who,” said Maryville’s impressive linebacker Lou Birchfield, who once again led a defense which has allowed just 53 points all season.

The Cherokees certainly had their chances, driving three times inside the 30, but Birchfield and Company stepped up on each occasion to turn away McMinn County. A missed field goal, and interception at the 5 and another stop on a fourth-down try at the 5 assured the Cherokees wouldn’t score a TD for the first time since being shut out a year ago by the Rebels.

“I think the biggest difference in the game was the fact they finished off three drives and we came up short on three drives. You can’t expect to win against a team like that when those sort of things happen,” said McMinn County tailback Jalen Hunt.

Hunt was absolutely brilliant just as he has been all season long; rushing it 27 times for 228 yards, 70 yards more than anyone else has put up on the Rebels this year. But the Rebels kept the all-state running back from the end zone, something no one else has done this year.

“The thing about most high school defenses is when a great player makes a big play, and Hunt made several of them on us, and gets it down close to the end zone, a lot times they just give in, but this group takes a lot of pride in diggings its heels in. They just have a mindset to try to force field goals. I thought that absolutely was the difference in the outcome tonight,” Maryville’s Hunt added.

For the most part, McMinn’s defense was up to the challenge, but Maryville quarterback Carson Jones was a surgeon in the pocket, and his ability to be precise led the rebels on three impressive drives, each ending in the end zone.

Jones led the Maryville offense on its opening possession, driving it 89 yards in 10 plays, twice converting third downs with passes before keeping it from five yards away for the opening score with 6:43 left in the first quarter. And so it remained through the first half, as both teams wound up with 122 yards of offense.   The Cherokees got it down to the 26 right before the break, but missed a field goal with nine seconds left.

Jones was again magnificent to start the second half after McMinn went three-and-out on the the first possession. Jones completed 7-of-7 passes in a 70-yard drive, rolling out of the pocket and flipping it to a wide open DJ Burks for a 15-yard score at the 3:34 mark of the third period and a 14-0 lead.

“We really feed off of our defense and those three-and-outs are big. I thought that and the ability to convert third downs for us really took some of the wind out of them,” said Jones, who was 16-of-19 for 193 yards on the night as the Rebels converted 6-of-9 third downs.

McMinn followed up the score with another Hunt-led drive, but an interception by Nick Dagel at the 5 thwarted it. Maryville put a nail in the coffin with a methodical 84-yard drive as Parker McGill broke loose on a 34-yard scamper and finished it off with a two-yard burst for a 21-0 lead with just 6:11 left.

Hunt had his longest run of the night on the first play of the next possession, going 59 yards to the rebels’ 11, but an incomplete pass on fourth down from 5 ended it.

“Today made us better,” said McMinn coach Bo Cagle. “All the things we didn’t do well tonight will get fixed and we will be better because of it. We got some answers tonight. We didn’t quit and we made them work till the very end. This ain’t over. To get what we want, we’re going to have to play them again.”

Hunt wound up with all but 16 of McMinn’s total yards for the night and moved his totals on the season to 1,820 yards. Maryville’s McGill finished with 77 yards going over the 1,000-yard mark as well.

The 19-point loss was actually the closest game Maryville has had since moving into Region 2-6A. The Rebels will try to close out a perfect regular season next Friday at Heritage while McMinn plays its long time rival Bradley to see which one of them will get the No. 2 seed in the playoffs.

 

Stats

 

MARYVILLE                       7    0     7     7   –   21

MCMINN COUNTY            0    0     0     2   –    2

 

MHS – Carson Jones 2 run (Corbin Price kick) (6:43, 1st)

MHS – DJ Burke 15 pass from Carson Jones (Corbin Price kick) (3:34, 3rd)

MHS – Parker McGill 2 run (Corbin Price kick) (6:11, 4th)

McC – Punter tackled in end zone for safety (2:05, 4th)

 

 

MHS               STATS            MC

15                    1st Downs        8

28-106             Rush                34-233

193                  Pass                 11

299                  Total               244

16-19-0           Passes             4-8-1

6-49                 Penalties         8-85

2-34.0              Punts               5-39.6    

0-0                   Fumbles          0-0

 

Individual Stats

 

Rushing: Parker McGill 17-77, Carson Jones 12-26, Nick Dagel 1-4 (M); Jalen Hunt 27-228, Jayden Miller 5-0, Cody Thompson 2-1 (MC).

Passing: Carson Jones 16-19-0 193 yards (M); Jayden Miller 4-8-1 10 yards (MC).

Receiving:  Parker McGill 3-51, DJ Burke 4-49, Nick Dagel 1-29, Markel Fortenberry 1-13 (M); Nick Bottoms 1-10, Jalen James 2-(-4), Aiden Bautsch 1-5 (MC).

 

Records: Maryville (9-0, 5-0 2-6A); McMinn County (8-1, 4-1 2-6A).

 

(Contact James Beach via email at 1134james@gmail.com or Twitter @beachnut1134)

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