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West Lauderdale Shuts Out Quitman

WEST LAUDERDALE SHUTS OUT QUITMAN

The West Lauderdale High School Knights defeated the Quitman High School Panthers 20-0 Friday night to remain undefeated at 7-0 in the first divisional contest for both squads. The Knights’ defense proved to be a stingy bunch, holding Quitman to zero first downs in the first half and ending the game with interceptions on Quitman’s last three drives. All three picks came inside the Knight 20-yard-line with one coming in their endzone. Knights coach Stan McCain was happy to get district play started with a win and tipped his hat to his defense for the win. “I’m real proud of our team,” McCain said. “It’s always good when you can get the first division win, especially against a good team. Our defense has played really well, and we rely on them because you can’t always get the offense you need, so we rely on the defense to get it done, and they’ve stepped up all season.” Quitman coach Steve Bynum saw his team commit too many errors but saw his squad fight until the final buzzer. “We just had too many mistakes early on with drops and bad throws and giving a good team like West Lauderdale a short field just dug too big of a hole, but we’ll go back and figure it out and get after Newton County next week,” Bynum said. The Knights scored on their first drive of the game after deferring to recieve and holding the Panthers on a three-and-out that netted minus-9 yards, with Keshun Grace reeling off a 20-yard run before Turbo McKee found Jason Newbaker in the endzone for a 5-yard touchdown pass. Peyton George nailed the extra point to give West a 7-0 lead at the 9:08 mark in the first quarter. Neither team could get anything going offensively as both defenses rose up to stop the opposing offenses before West took possession with a little over a minute left in the first frame and put together a seven-play drive that covered 61 yards. The big play of the drive was a McKee to Kurt Rackley pitch-and-catch for 41 yards, setting West up at the Quitman 10-yard line. Grace found paydirt two plays later when he raced 7 yards into the endzone. George was true on the PAT to extend the Knight lead to 14-0 with 10:05 remaining in the first half. West Lauderdale took the kick to open the second half and moved the ball down the field behind the running of McKee, Grace and Rivers Irby. Facing a third down and 5 to go, McKee found Grace, who raced down the field for a 52-yard scoring pass and run to give West the game’s final score at 20-0. McKee ended the night 5 of 8 for 116 yards and two scores. Rackley had 101 yards from scrimmage, with 60 coming on the ground. The Newbaker brothers, Jason and Justin, had a sack apiece with Jason also collecting two tackles for loss. Tylo Phillips had multiple quarterback hurries and Michael Washington controlled the Panther running game from his middle linebacker position. Phillip Naylor, Irby and T. J. Hersey each had interceptions for the Knights. Panthers quarterback Jed Lewis completed 4 of 16 pass attempts for 73 yards, and Levi Myrick had 24 yards rushing. Chris Cooley paced the Panther defense with two fumble recoveries. The Knights will continue division play next week at Northeast Jones High School, while Quitman looks to notch its first division game against Newton County High School at home.

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