The McDonald County football team rode a big individual night from senior running back Sam Barton and the Mustangs picked up their first win of the season, 34-14, at Marshfield on Friday, Sept. 1.
Barton rushed 33 times for 244 yards and scored all five of the Mustangs' touchdowns.
"He had a great night," MCHS coach Kellen Hoover said. "We played really physical. That's always our goal. We were really physical up front on both sides of the ball. Sam had some big holes to run through and Sam ran hard."
The Mustangs (1-1) led 14-0 at halftime after Barton scored touchdowns in the first and second quarters.
Marshfield's Marcus Gritts returned the opening kickoff of the second half 79 yards for a touchdown to pull the Jays within 14-7, but the Mustangs responded with three more touchdown runs from Barton in the third quarter.
Barton had TD runs of 12, 2 and 36 yards in the third.
Destyn Dowd added 92 rushing yards on 14 carries, while Malosi Sosef had 48 rushing yards on 5 carries.
The Mustangs finished with 377 rushing yards as a team and 67 passing yards for a total of 444 yards in offense.
Dowd completed 9 of 13 passes for 67 yards. Josh Pacheco caught four passes for 33 yards, while Tucker Walters had four catches for 20 yards and Barton one catch for 14 yards.
Hoover said the Mustangs' passing game did its job against a team that was guarding against the deep ball.
"We played two teams in a row that said, we're not going to get beat deep," Hoover said. "We were not able to take shots over top. Destyn did a good job of managing the game."
Hoover said Dowd picked up two key third-down conversions in the game, one with his legs on a third-and-25 and another on a pass to Pacheco on third down-and-15.
Richard Gasca kicked 4 of 5 extra points, with the one miss being blocked.
Defensively, the Mustangs held Marshfield (0-2) to 172 yards of total offense. The bulk of those yards came on the ground, with the Jays picking up 102 rushing yards.
Dayvion Harris led the Jays with 16 carries for 80 yards, while Tyce Jones had seven carries for 22 yards. Jones added a TD run in the third quarter
Jones completed 5 of 13 passes for 70 yards and was intercepted three times, including twice by Josh Pacheco. Pacheco also had a fumble.
"He had a big night defensively," Hoover said of Pacheco. "Our kids just played physical all over the field, so I thought that was good."
The Mustangs are back at home on Friday, Sept. 8, against Logan-Rogersville (1-1).
The Wildcats are 1-1 to start the season after beating East Newton 28-0 in the season opener and losing last week 34-14 to Lamar.
"Rogersville is an aggressive team," Hoover said. "They've always been good defensively. They have linebackers that fly around. They're pretty athletic. They slant and move and can really cause you problems. We have to make sure we're staying true to our rules so we can open up more holes for Sam. We're always looking forward to opening up the passing game more.
"On defense, they do something similar to us. They like to roll out their quarterback and give him half-field reads, and they want to run the football. They've got a good running back. We'll have to be good up front again and be ready for a team that wants to run the football."
Aidrian Short/Special to McDonald County Press McDonald County kicker Richard Gasca tees up the football for a kickoff against Marshfield on Friday, Sept. 1.
Aidrian Short/Special to McDonald County Press McDonald County running back Sam Barton (No. 10) runs around the left side during the Mustangs' game at Marshfield on Sept. 1. Barton had 244 rushing yards and five touchdowns in the Mustangs' 34-14 win.