Rural Retreat overcomes Grayson County

By JIM CUNNINGHAM/Staff

The Rural Retreat Indians overcame a slew of turnovers to defeat the Grayson County Blue Devils 14-6 in a non-district football game played Friday night at Community Stadium.
The Indians gave up eight turnovers (four interceptions and four fumbles) but somehow managed to limit the Blue Devils to just a second quarter touchdown.
“It was ugly,” admitted Rural Retreat Head Coach Quinton Hensley, “but we’ll take it.”
The coach did like the way the RR defense came up big when it had to. And it had to numerous times due to Grayson County getting several of the turnovers deep in Indian territory.
And Hensley also liked his team’s running game of Tyler Caudill, Tyler Hash and others. He noted that if the team can eliminate a lot of the mistakes it has been making, “we’ll be a good football team.”
Caudill, a freshman, led the Indians in rushing with 226 yards on 19 carries, and he scored his team’s two touchdowns.
The fans should have known the homecoming game was going to be somewhat odd because it started about 15 minutes later than its scheduled 7:30 p.m. kickoff due to the lights going out on the field. Then the Rural Retreat band was virtually drowned out as it played the Star Spangled Banner due to an especially long (and loud) train that roared by.
Rural Retreat’s first possession of the game ended with its first turnover, an interception that set up the Blue Devils at the RR 40-yard line.
The RR defense, however, pushed the Devils back to force a punt.
The Indians began their second series backed up on their own three-yard line. A good run by Hash on second down moved the chains out to near the 30.
Hash then had another first down run followed by one by Caudill that put the Indians into Devil territory.
It was just a few plays after that in which Caudill broke loose for a 25-yard touchdown run. The PAT kick attempt missed, but RR had taken a 6-0 lead with 5:54 left in the first period.
Neither team threatened for the rest of the first quarter. The Blue Devils took advantage of RR’s second interception of the night early in the second period. The interception was returned down to the Indian three. Ethan Hash did the honors for GC with a three-yard TD. A pass attempt on the PAT failed, to leave the score tied at 6-6 with 10:59 left in the first half.
Terry Fields, who made several good tackles on defense for Rural Retreat, recovered a fumble to end a GC possession.
The Indians then marched downfield, mostly behind the running of Caudill, to set up another score. Caudill raced the final 32 yards for the touchdown with only 2:18 left in the half. He also carried over the two-point conversion to put the Indians back on top at 14-6.
Fields recovered another fumble on Grayson’s next series, but the Indians turned the ball over on another interception.
Grayson County punted on its first possession of the second half, and the Indians also found themselves in a punting situation on their first possession. However, the snap sailed over the punter’s head, and the Blue Devils took over at the Indian 20.
Grayson County picked up one first down to the RR 12 and then advanced to the one-yard line, first and goal.
Incredibly, the RR defense held on three straight running plays and made an interception on fourth down to escape the threat.
The Indian offense continued to have problems with fumbles and interceptions for the rest of the game, but its defense came to the rescue each time.
With the win, Rural Retreat improved its overall record to 1-2. Grayson County fell to 0-3.

Grayson 0 6 0 0 – 6
Rural Retreat 6 8 0 0 – 14

Scoring:
RR – Caudill 25 run (kick failed)
GC – Hash 3 run (pass failed)
RR – Caudill 32 run (Caudill run)
(T – 2:28)