Ahead 14-8, the Rising Sun football team performed calisthenics to prepare for the second half as coach Rich Opp paced the sideline. "You're on the doorstep of a victory," Opp told his team. "You've got to kick the door down." That's precisely what they did. The Tigers earned their first win of the season by pulling away to upend host Joppatowne 28-8 Friday night. Dating back to last year, Rising Sun had lost 10 games in a row. "It means a lot," Opp said. "We needed it. It had been six long, dry weeks. And I'm most happy for the kids."
The Tigers took command late in the third quarter. Winless Joppatowne had the ball in Rising Sun territory before a sack by John Falker forced the Mariners into a 2nd down and 30. On third down, Dustin Flowers picked off a pass. Behind the running of Maurice McCargo, the Tigers marched down the field and scored on a five-yard run by Noah Boyd to up their lead to 20-8 with 1:20 left in the third quarter. Boyd added an eight-yard scoring scamper three minutes into the fourth quarter and also ran for a two-point conversion to make it 28-8. The touchdown was set up by a 43-yard gallop by Joe Jones. Jones finished with 136 yards on 14 carries. McCargo contributed 83 yards on 17 attempts. Cole Stafford supplied 77 yards on six rushes and Boyd ran 12 times for 59 yards. The Tigers totaled 387 yards of total offense with 365 of that coming on the ground. Rising Sun went on top 8-0 with 2:11 left in the first quarter. Following an interception by Ethan Smith at the Tigers' 39, Rising Sun needed just three plays to hit paydirt, capped by a 43-yard jaunt from Stafford. Jones ran for a two-point conversion. The Tigers capitalized on a poor punt by Joppatowne to add to their lead in the opening minute of the second quarter. Taking over at the Mariners' 28, Jones scored from nine yards out three plays later. Joppatowne got on the board with 4:41 left before halftime on a 29-yard pass play. Rising Sun squandered a couple of opportunities to score again before the break. The Tigers came up a yard short on 4th down from the Mariners' 11 with 1:24 to go and then later threw an interception in the end zone. Having already dealt with an abundance of on-field adversity, Rising Sun was undaunted by the missed chances. The Tigers managed to remain positive despite the lack of positive results. "Our coach kept pushing us to play hard no matter what," said McCargo. "Even though we were getting sad about our losses we couldn't just give up our season. We still had four games to go. We had to play our best and keep going." That attitude paid dividends Friday night. "It's great, honestly," McCargo said. "I think we all wanted it really bad. We came out here and played really hard." Jones said notching a victory felt "amazing." "All through practice we kept our mindsets positive," he said. "We were focused on a 'W' and we weren't taking another 'L'." Opp never doubted his team's disposition. "Without being too cliché-ish, if that's a word, we said getting off the deck is a life skill," said Opp. "We can either go belly-up and get up off the deck from the losses. That's character and that's a life skill. When you can't pay your rent or you have sick kids. You have hardships in your life and you get up off the deck. That was my analogy. I said, 'I'm not going to give up on you. Don't you give up on us. We're not giving up on each other.' That's basically it." Comments are closed.
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