Wildcats stop Sardis in spring football jamboree

SARDIS CITY — The football teams from Sardis and Guntersville concluded spring training with some Saturday night lights at Sardis Stadium.

Guntersville downed the Lions 10-6 in the varsity half of a spring jamboree. The Wildcats claimed a 7-6 win in the junior varsity/freshman half of the game.

“We’ve had a good spring,” Guntersville head coach Lance Reese said. “We’ve had a good offseason in the weight room.

“We kind of had a rough start tonight with some young guys out there, but they gained some confidence and ended up playing a lot better in that second quarter.

“I really like the format, where the third quarter we got our JVs in and the fourth quarter we got our freshmen in so everybody got to play, which is what you should do in a spring game.

“We’re going to have to take this and just continue to work hard in the summer. We got a couple of guys injured in spring training that are really important. Hopefully we’ll get them back.

“Hopefully this was good for Sardis and for us, and we wish them nothing but the best.”

Sardis threatened on its first possession of the varsity half.

Jay Owens’ 27-yard pass to Luke Morris gave the Lions a first down at the Guntersville 23-yard line. They reached the 5 before consecutive 5-yard penalties pushed them back to the 15, where they turned the ball over on downs.

Sardis drove for a touchdown on its second series. Luke Morris ran 10 yards to the end zone with 1:34 remaining in the first period.

Guntersville’s John Ryan Shirley broke up Owens’ two-point conversion pass, leaving the Lions in front 6-0.

Logan Pate’s 37-yard pass to Jack Harris, who made a leaping catch, gave the Wildcats a first down at the Sardis 33.

Pate completed the drive with a 25-yard TD pass to Campbell Leach, who broke a couple of tackles on his way to the end zone with 11:09 remaining in the second quarter.

Pablo Rios’ extra point gave GHS a 7-6 lead.

Shirley intercepted a pass in the end zone with 8:53 to go in the second.

Guntersville dropped a TD pass with 2:13 to play and then turned it over on downs with 1:49 on the clock.

Clay Adams picked off a Sardis pass and returned it 40 yards to the Sardis 17. On the last play of the varsity half, Rios nailed a 32-yard field goal.

The Lions’ scored first in the junior varsity/freshman half, as Logan Edwards found the end zone on a 2-yard run with 48.9 seconds to go in the third period. Dewayne Hundley broke up the two-point conversion pass.

Cooper Davidson scored the Wildcats’ TD on a 1-yard run with 6:41 remaining in the fourth quarter. Rios kicked the point-after to put GHS in front 7-6.

Guntersville finished 3-7 in 2018. The Wildcats advanced to the Class 5A state playoffs as the No. 4 seed from Region 8.

“We started four freshmen last year and now those guys are going to be sophomores, and we had a couple freshmen that contributed tonight,” Reese said. “We’re still a young team, and we’re just going to keep working hard to get better.

“We’ve got 10 seniors and several of them started last year. Even though they’re small in number it’s a good group and all of them contribute, and they’re going to be an important part of our season ahead.”

Guntersville kicks off its 2019 season Aug. 30 at Boaz.

“We had a good spring,” Sardis head coach Gene Hill said. “We didn’t get anybody hurt.

“We only had about six practices because of the girls playing in the [Class 5A] State [Softball] Tournament. We didn’t get to practice much, which is OK, but we got enough practices in and let our guys play against a different face and saw what we need to see. I think we’ve got a chance to have a pretty good football team.

“We’ve got to eliminate some mistakes that are obviously going to happen in the spring. Just like on the first drive, when we crossed the 50 we had five penalties. We had a lot of penalties tonight that hurt, and we’ve got to get all that corrected.

“I thought both our backs were better. Luke was really good. We ran the ball pretty effectively, but we wanted to do some things.

“We crossed the 50 and we took a shot to [Jacob] Hopper when we were really moving the ball, and we overthrew and they intercepted. I felt like maybe we could have kept running the football and Coach [Zach Wallace] did too, but we wanted to try to do some other things in the spring that we probably wouldn’t do if it was in the regular season.

“We gave up two or three big plays on defense, but for the most part I thought we played pretty well.”

The Lions open their 2019 campaign Aug. 30 by hosting Sylvania. Sardis went 3-7 in its first season in 5A in 2018.