Luck wasn’t in Rock-dale’s favor Friday evening in Belton where the Tigers lost to Grandview 42-7 in a game RHS outgained the defending state champions 309-307 in total yardage but had seven turnovers.
Rockdale football coach Jeff Miller couldn’t quite make sense of his team’s loss despite the errors.
“The frustrating thing about the game is that I don’t know if we necessarily dominated,” Miller said. “But we played well enough to win.
“I’ve never been a part of a ball game where every single thing went wrong for one team. I challenge anyone to find a game where one team outgained the other and lost by 35 points. That’s incomprehensible and that just doesn’t happen. It’s baffling to me. I would play them again tomorrow and with the intention of winning the ball game. I don’t think they’re the better team necessarily.”
PLAY-BY-PLAY–The blue-and-gold had early momentum after forcing the Zebras to turn the ball over on downs in their first series.
Two plays later, Grandview scored their first touchdown when Austin Boyd returned an interception for 42 yards to give them the lead.
The Tigers’ were forced to punt on their next series but regained possession after the ball bounced off the back of Boyd near the GHS 30-yard line.
Cam’Ron Valdez scored his 26th TD of the season four plays later on a one-yard run.
Boyd put the Zebras back ahead with a 25-yard pass from Jentsch.
With the score 14-7, the Tigers struggled to get on the ground running as three breakaway runs by Valdez were cut short due to slippery turf in Belton. They ended the series with a missed field goal.
RHS got the ball again when the defense forced Grandview to punt three plays later. RHS had the ball near the 50.
They made it to the GHS 24 when bad luck reared it’s head as a pass intended for Kesean Raven slipped out of Raven’s hands off the helmet of Boyd right into the hands of Jentsch.
A Jentsch-Boyd connection for 57 yards pushed the Zebras down the field and they went up 21-7 on a 14-yard catch by Luke Ferguson.
Jentsch made another interception on Rockdale’s next series catching another Robinson pass in the end zone. Grandview led 21-7 at the half.
The Tigers began the second half failing to score.
Grandview extended their lead to 28-7 on a 13-play, 87-yard drive that ended with Jentsch and Ferguson linking up for the second time for a 12-yard TD pass.
Pushed by an 18-yard run by Valdez and a 12-yard catch by Landon Towns, the Tigers got down to the two-yard line before Grandview got the ball back on a fumble.
In the fourth, GHS sealed their victory, scoring on a Rockdale fumble and on a Tremayne Gullatte one-yard run.
The Tigers’ 2018 season also ended with a loss to the Zebras when they fell 45-21 at Waco ISD Stadium.
“Ever since they beat us last year, we really knew that for us to play in the state championship that we’d have to go through (Grandview),” said RHS football coach Jeff Miller. “Our preparation during the off-season was geared towards trying to get more physical and I thought we accomplished that.”
Grandview moves on to play in the area game on Friday against Winnie-East Chambers in Brenham.
STATS–Valdez led the Tigers in the backfield with 160 yards on 29 carries and their only touchdown.
Kesean Raven and Anthony Dansby were the top receivers with four catches on 53 yards and three catches on 52 yards. The Tigers were without Texas Wesleyan commit Ross Loth, who was sick with the flu during the bi-district game.
Robinson was 12-for-21 with 135 yards and threw three interceptions.
“Jace is one of our leaders and he’s one of the reasons we are as successful as we have been on offense,” Miller said. “He’s very passionate about this game and he’s such a great competitor.
“We put a lot on our quarterback and he handles it very well. If everybody cared as much as he did, this would be one of the easiest coaching jobs in the world.”
SENIORS–This was the final game for seniors Loth, Landon Towns, Malikai McKenzie, Ethan Hughes, Qua’Shawn Crawford, Levi Baggerly, Alden Bangert, Keylan Hairston, Brandon Hernandez, Cole Rickman, Chris Reyes, Joe Vargas, Kaden Kruse, Colby Monroe and Jabez Dunn.
“Hats off to our seniors,” Miller said. “They provided good leadership and played extremely hard.
“I’m sorry it didn’t last longer.”
NEXT SEASON–For the 2020 season, the Tigers will still have their core of Robinson, Valdez and Raven and will only lose three on offense and two on defense.
To get ready for 2020, Miller says he hopes to do more of the same with a bit of new.
“I thought we had a really good off-season this past year,” he said. “So we’ll probably need to do a lot of the same things.
“But we need to implement some stuff that teaches us how to compete a little better for when our backs are against the wall. I don’t know if you can emulate those kinds of circumstances but we need to try to put our players in situations that are uncomfortable and see how they respond.”
SEASON LEADERS–
Robinson ended his season with 2,459 passing yards, the third most for a Tigerquarterback passing David Franklin’s 2,399 yards in 2015 and only behind Torry Locklin’s 2017 season of 2,560 yards and Clayton Gibbs’s record of 3,086 in 2013.
Robinson is also third all-time in career passing yards with 4,113. He only needs 503 yards next season to break his own QB coach Ethan Brinkley’s school record of 4,616 yards.
Valdez finished the season with 1,697 rushing yards breaking Daniel Brooks’s 2010 record of 1,696 yards with the second most rushing yards in a season only trailing Locklin’s 2,491 in 2017.
He is the third all-time career rusher for the Tigers with 2,905. The junior needs less than 500 yards next season to break the school record of 3,389 held by Don Wesley since the 1977 season.
Raven finished the season with 1,274 career rushing yards which is fifth all-time among Rockdale wide receivers.
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