The Troopers’ long ride home
SOUTHLAKE – It was late in the fourth quarter last night before
the Dragon Marching Band struck up “Hey, Baby,” the traditional signal that
it’s time to call in the dogs, pee on the fire and head for the barn as the
Southlake Carroll Dragons dispatch another gridiron foe.
But truthfully, the die had been cast – and the future
foretold – halfway through the 1st quarter when the Dragons jumped
to a 24-7 lead over an overmatched squad from El Paso Eastwood, barely breaking
a sweat or mussing a lock of their collective hair in the process.
The Eastwood Troopers (yes, that’s their mascot) didn’t put
up much of a struggle in last night’s contest, proving unable to do much more than stand and watch Carroll put on an offensive display on the ground and in
the air.
Dragon running back Owen Allen, opening his senior year with
his usual flair for the dramatic, led the offensive fireworks, rolling to 103
rushing yards and four – count ’em – four touchdowns. He’s already the Dragons’
all-time leading rusher and is only 2,000 yards shy of the Dallas-Fort Worth
area rushing title, according to our friends at The Dallas Morning News.
Don’t bet against him.
The last time I checked, this kid, who has been running
rings around defensive linemen since he was a 14-year-old freshman, has
received no college offers yet. That stupefyingly outrageous fact leaves me
breathless – yet another indication that our civilization is crumbling around
us.
Burning desire
But I suspect it has created in young Allen a burning,
all-consuming desire to prove to the college recruiters just how wrong and how
stupid, stupid, stupid they have been.
Joining Allen on the
offensive stage was senior quarterback Kaden Anderson, who ruled the skies
above Dragon Stadium yesterday, completing 24 of 29 passes for 327 yards and
three touchdowns.
Anderson showed remarkable poise and skill – and a gritty,
methodical approach to the job – when he took over last year for superstar Quinn Ewers –
now calling signals for UT as a freshman – after he decided to forego his
senior year at Carroll to join the college ranks early. (Money, of course, was
the reason for the treason.)
Anderson has a young crop
of receivers to throw to this year, and he distributed the ball liberally among
them against the stumbling Troopers. He threw TD passes to four separate
receivers – juniors Jacob Jordan, Harrison Moore and Trey Ferri and senior
Harrison Wagner.
Jordan, who as a sophomore quickly made himself indispensable, led the receiving corps yesterday, snaring eight of Anderson’s missiles for 117 yards. He invigorated
the desultory Dragon offense and sparked the subsequent scoring spree with a
dramatic kickoff return after Eastwood jumped to a surprising 7-3 lead early in
the 1st quarter.
Is this the year for a ninth state title?
After the Dragons' initial drive ended in a Tyler White field
goal, the Troopers responded with a neat and tidy march to paydirt. Jordan then
fielded the ensuing kickoff at his 20-yard line, veered left and sprinted 80 untouched
yards to reclaim the lead from presumptuous Eastwood.
“When I caught the ball, I saw the hole opening up and I
went left,” he told Dragon Radio after the game. “I knew I could take it to the
house. And with the help of the other guys, I did.”
Interrupted drive
On the next series, Eastwood faced a 3rd down
when Trooper quarterback Evan Minjarez (10 of 27, 213 yards, 1 TD, 2 INT) dropped
back and zipped the ball downfield. Dragon lineman Logan
Anderson snatched it enroute and plunged to the Eastwood 20. From there, Allen
took it in for his first TD.
Eastwood managed another TD drive in the second quarter, but
by then the Dragons had put the game on cruise control and scored at will until
the night mercifully ended for the Troopers.
Preseason expectations for the 2022 Dragons have been
running high. And why not?
Head coach Riley Dodge, who enters his fifth year as Dragon
head coach, is enjoying the sort of coaching career that Hollywood
scriptwriters would dismiss as too implausible to work on screen.
Son of the legendary Todd Dodge, Riley led the 2006 Dragons
to the state championship. Named Carroll head coach in 2018 only months before his 30th birthday, he took his teams to the fourth round of the playoffs in each of his first two years. In the 2020 season, amid the chaos created by COVID, he brought the Dragons to the state championship game. There he faced his father
in the so-called Dodge Bowl, an anticlimactic contest won by the old man in the
penultimate year of his stellar career.
Which brings us to last year, when the Dragons made it to
the semi-finals before falling to an old and bitter foe, the Duncanville
Panthers.
With all that as prologue, why shouldn’t Dragon Nation be
licking its collective chops at the prospects for 2022? And it’s not alone. Dave
Campbell’s Texas Football, THE authority on Texas high school football, picked
Southlake to win the Division II 6-A championship this year, pointing out the
promise of Anderson building on his stunning first year as signal caller and of the amazing Allen running rampant in his final year as a Dragon.
As noted above, Anderson has a talented, if largely
untested, receiving corps. But he got things off to a grand start last night,
and the hopeless Troopers gave the passing game an opportunity to test drive its timing, coordination and teamwork.
Bunch of bullies
Anderson and Allen are working behind a formidable offensive
line – a hefty bunch of bullies determined to rule the trenches.
As always in Dragon country, the defense remains a mystery.
It fared well against the uninspired Eastwood. Cade Parks was his usual
intimidating self, and the secondary was alert and opportunistic. But the real
test will come later. Size will be problematic as usual, but discipline,
determination and hard work – traditional hallmarks of a Carroll defensive unit
– will knit things together by the time the season heats up. We hope.
Eastwood brought neither its band nor its drill team on the long hike to
Southlake. Only a small but hardy band of faithful, clustered protectively in
the middle of the largely empty visitors’ side of Dragon Stadium, were on hand to
witness the slaughter. Poor devils. They certainly didn’t have much to talk about on that long
trek home through some of the roughest, toughest, most inhospitable terrain on
earth. (Trust me, I'm being kind about the landscape.)
The Dragons travel to Flower Mound next week to meet the
Marcus Marauders on their home turf. The Marauders fell before the Highland
Park Scots this week, 38-24. The Scotties are playing with the big boys in 6A
this year, and they proved rather decisively that they’ve got the firepower to
be successful.
Marcus would love to soothe its wounded ego with a beatdown
of the highly regarded Dragons. Can the Marauders manage that? That’s why we
play the game!
Go Dragons!
Here we come, Marauders!
