Rice raids Ganado

    The 3A blue and white Rice Consolidated Raiders visited Ganado on Friday night for a friendly game of football and took the evening with a final score of 28-14.
    “We have a long ways to go, and we need to have improvement in the offensive line, such as assignments, techniques and probably overall more effort,” said Wright. “It’s a process, our schedule is brutally tough, and with a three-day practice week we just have a long ways to go before we can make more progress.” He added his biggest concern is the Indian offensive line. “We had a hard time containing the team and we gave up too many third-down conversions.”
    Captains and seniors #52 Ross Fowler and injured #5 Israel Cruz took the field to represent their team in the coin toss, but Rice won and chose to receive the ball. Junior #18 Jorge Campuzano kicked off the night and junior #4 Matthew Sterling was the first Indian to make a big stop in the game and get the fans revved up.
    The Raiders started pushing their way down the field at the Ganado’s 25-yard line, but the Indians weren’t having too much of it, doing their best at stopping them in their tracks. Junior #22 Garrett McCann, senior #85 Mark Macha and senior #9 Jacob Foltyn made some great stops for their team before Macha stopped a Rice pass and McCann stopped another at the 30-yard line.
    But that wasn’t enough, the Raiders scored a touchdown in the first quarter with 9:18 left. Their point after touchdown was good as well, making the score 7-0 in Rice’s favor.
    Senior #8 Dalton Service caught Rice’s kick and was stopped at the 30-yard line. Junior quarterback #11 Matt Bridges began his plays passing to McCann for a couple of downs. Service missed the pass on the fourth down but was still able to kick the ball nonetheless, and getting Ganado back on the other side of the field, just not as far as they intended. While Rice had the ball, junior #55 Malcolm Chaisson sacked the quarterback, getting himself and the crowd exploding with some excitement. Junior #28 Christian Palacios made two good stops in a row for his team, and Bridges caused a pass interference by the finish line.
    A false start was made by the Raiders followed by an incomplete pass, and left the Indians at the 45-yard line with the ball. Junior quarterback #7 Michael-Douglas Maresh took the field and gave McCann a carry, but an incomplete pass happened between the two in the play after. Service kicked the ball again back to the Raiders at the 24-yard line.
    Foltyn, senior #2 Brandon Lister, McCann and Maresh wouldn’t let Rice get away from them, and a pass between Bridges and senior #6 Bobby Garcia started the Indians’ ball on good footing in the next set of plays. Rice attempted a touchdown but it was no good, just before the referees had some issues figuring out where the ball had landed. Palacios stopped Rice at the 3-yard line before the end of the first quarter, but couldn’t keep them there. Rice scored at the beginning of the second quarter with 11:54 left, and the PAT was good, bringing the score to 14-0 in the Raider’s favor.
    Senior #1 Caleb Thedford caught Rice’s ball, and McCann and Foltyn made good carries for first downs, but didn’t make too much of a gain before Rice took the ball back. They gained a handful of yards before Bridges interfered a pass and was able to run the ball to the 15-yard line, causing Indian fans to get on their feet.
    Maresh took the field again and made some passes to McCann, but the Indians didn’t get as far down the field as they wanted until Maresh passed to Thedford and he made the first Ganado touchdown of the night with 6:42 left in the first half of the game. The PAT was not good, making the score 14-6, still in Rice’s favor.
    Both teams did what they could with the remaining time, but the score was still 14-6 at halftime.
    The third quarter did not have a peak until the end when Rice scored another touchdown and PAT with 54 seconds left. It was similar to earlier quarters in that the Indians mentioned above were still doing their job to the best of their ability. The score was 21-6 for Rice at the end of the third.
    The fourth quarter picked up for both teams. Co-quarterbacks Maresh and Bridges did what they could in passes to McCann in the fourth quarter, while Palacios, Foltyn and Bridges took down some Raiders in order to slow them down. Another touchdown by Rice was made with 7:29 left in the game, plus the PAT, bringing the score to 28-6, Rice.
    Ganado was able to answer back though, Sterling ran the ball to another touchdown for the Indians with 4:50 left in the quarter, and Foltyn was able to run the ball in for a two-point conversion, making the new score 28-14. Campuzano kicked the ball to the Raiders and senior #62 Garreth Bundick made a great stop in the next play.
    Mistakes made by Rice with incomplete passes and fouls possibly stopped them from scoring more points before the end of the game, leaving the final score 28-14 in Rice’s favor.
    M.D. Maresh said Ganado kept fighting throughout the night without ever giving up, and commented the team can build on that. “We just need to get back to work this week and fix what we need to fix, we were just disappointed in wanting to win,” he said. “Our defense had done well, we just missed some big plays.”
    Thedford believes the game loss was tough but good for the team and opened their eyes. “We came in with two great scrimmages behind us, but we still have things we need to polish up on. It took a lot of pressure off of us being that Wright had never lost a game on home field,” he said. “We need to come to practice with better effort and better shape to where we can actually finish the whole game. I think we’re in a good spot.”
    The Ganado Indians will host their next football game against Brazos-Wallis at 7:30 on Friday, Sept. 4.