Photos by Jowdy Photography
Beads of sweat ran down the player’s faces onto their cotton jerseys as the sun beat down on them. The quarterback stared down the Panthers who in turn stared down at him. The quarterback then yelled the play at his team. The play burned into their minds because of the hours of practice it took to get ready for the play. As the snapper snapped the ball, the quarterback gave it to the running back.
Once the leathery ball hit the running back’s fingers, he took off, leaving behind everything. As an opening through the middle appeared, the running back made a quick decision and ran through it. The opponent pushed and shoved just to get a tackle but the still defensive line kept them at bay. When the running back got to the end zone, the students cheered in victory as they were able to get the first touchdown. The fight song could be heard in the background as the students continued to cheer on.
When the game ended on Saturday. Jesuit unfortunately lost to Plano east with a score of 41-30. While the score may not say much, the game was interesting with different twists and turns during the beginning.
The game started at 10:00 a.m. on September 9, 2017 at the Cotton Bowl with Jesuit having the first possession. Jesuit was able to get an early lead in the beginning and everyone’s hopes increased immensely. As the game went on, the scores during the game got closer and closer until Plano East unfortunately got the lead and won the game.
Quarterback Parker Towns ‘18 said, “We expected to control the ball, protect it, we made an emphasis on no turnovers, and we accomplished that task.” Their motivation to make no mistakes showed by being able to have an early lead with the score being 21-17 with 1:48 remaining. But the second half hit and, as Holden Hill ‘18, a linebacker, said, “Plano East came out and hit us back pretty hard in the second half.” Plano East somehow was able to win the game by scoring 21 points in the second half and Jesuitonly able to score 11 points.
However, the game was very interesting and fun to watch. Luke Wyand ‘18, a spectator, said, “My favorite part of was the first half mostly because Jesuit was winning by a big margin but also because there were so many students in the student section during this part of the game.” Anything good that happened to the Jesuit team, you could hear the students cheering the team on.
Though the game ended in a loss, the football team was able to learn a lot from the game. Holden Hill ‘18 said, “We hit the film pretty hard and realized our mistakes, so we are focusing a ton on the details in practice this week, and we are really bringing as much energy as possible.” From the looks of this, it sounds like the football team has been training as hard as they can to perfect every detail for their game against Lake Travis. Both Holden Hill ‘18 and Parker Towns ‘18 say that the team is looking forward to the game against Lake Travis. They know that Lake Travis is going to be a tough opponent but they believe that if they play together as a team and do their jobs, they’ll bring home a win for Jesuit. Go Rangers!