The Pampa Harvesters (2-3) traveled up the road on Highway 70 to face the Perryton Rangers (2-3) in the final tuneup before district play begins on Oct. 11 at Hereford. The game was played on Ranger Field under beautiful weather of sunny skies and light wind. The one complaint about the weather was unusually warm weather in the upper 80s, a rarity this late in September. It was homecoming for the Rangers.
Before the game, Perryton recognized the Bilyeu family on the loss of Kaley. They also announced buckets would be passed during the game for donations to give to the family. A very nice gesture by the home team.
Perryton won the coin toss and deferred to the second half. They would kick off to the Harvesters to begin the game.
Junior Clayton Ward took over at quarterback for the Harvesters as normal starter, senior Jarren Hill, was unavailable for the night. Pampa was also without junior running back Max Neff for the contest.
The Harvesters went three-and-out to start the game. Perryton scored first blood quickly and were successful on the two-point play to take an 8-0 lead with 8:30 to play in the first quarter.
Pampa was unable to get anything going on their next two drives either and found themselves in a huge hole, down 14-0, just before the end of the first quarter.
Another failed Pampa drive gave Perryton the ball back to go down and score again for a 21-0 lead with 7:33 to play in the half. The Harvesters had miscommunication on the kickoff and Perryton also was able to recover the ensuing kickoff. It took just two plays and 14 seconds for Perryton to score again and take a 28-0 lead.
“We got our butts kicked. It is what it is. When you get your butt kicked like that it falls on the head coach. Apparently, I didn’t do a good enough job making sure that we had a good enough gameplan to get after it today. As a result, our kids suffered,” head coach Floyd White said. “I have to go in and take a big, deep look at myself and make sure we are more prepared to play from here on out. Ultimately, when you have a deal like this, there are some changes that are going to have to be made. What those changes are, I don’t know yet. We will have to take a look. We have our whole district slate to get ready for. We have to get locked in and ready to play.”
The Harvester offense finally got some action going on the next drive as Ward found senior running back Christian Davalos for an 8-yard gain and a first down to move the chains. Davalos would later strike paydirt with a 23-yard touchdown run with exactly 4 minutes left to play in the half. The extra point was kicked and good by junior Kicker Jeremiah Davis to make the score 28-7 Perryton.
The Rangers had a 12 play drive end up going 79 yards to score right before the end of the half and take a 35-7 lead into the locker room. The Harvesters found themselves in a massive hole and needing a big second half to get back into this ball game. Perryton would receive the opening kick of the second half.
At the 10:04 mark it looked like senior defensive back Britten Joyce had an interception but it was ruled incomplete.The Rangers kept driving but a fumble was recovered by Davalos with about 7:30 to play in the quarter to give Pampa a much needed chance to cut into the lead. Unfortunately, the Harvesters were unable to get anything going on that drive much like the others ones Friday night.
With 2:42 to play in the third quarter, Perryton struck paydirt again for a 28-yard touchdown score to make the lead now 42-7. The Rangers clearly came out with a gameplan to run the clock in the second half as that was another long drive.
The Harvesters found themselves driving at the end of the third quarter. The ball rested at the Perryton 35-yard line with a fourth-and-two upcoming to try and extend the drive.
Perryton had a long 60-yard touchdown pass negated by a penalty. Well, the very next play they went up top again for a 75-yard touchdown pass, this one counted. The score was now Perryton 49, Pampa 7 with 11:25 to play in the game.
Sophomore Gage Gamblin came into the game at quarterback on the next Pampa drive as they tried to muster anything on offense. Other than a 10-yard pass from Gamblin to junior wide receiver Jose Alonzo, the Harvester offense was stymied again.
Perryton seemed content to run the clock out but Pampa was able to force a turnover on downs with 1:19 to play in the game.Pampa just ran the clock out to end this one.
FINAL: Perryton 49, Pampa 7.
“At the end of it, we are going to have to really sit down and watch the film because when you lose 49-7 there is not really a whole lot of things you can take from it as a positive other than the fact you have to clean stuff up and get better,” White said.
SCORES FROM DISTRICT
Canyon hosted Piedra Vista from Farmington, NM. Canyon won 44-30.
Randall defeated Lubbock Estacado 50-26 on Thursday night.
Hereford had a bye week.
Dumas hosted Bushland. Bushland won in overtime, 48-42.
West Plains was on a bye week.
Pampa will take a break next week to rest, recoup, regroup, and get ready for district play. There is no game next Friday night. Pampa’s next game will be on the road at Hereford on October 11th. The game will kickoff at 7 PM.
“We will use part of the bye week to get healthy. The other part of it is that we have got to make sure that we are really getting ourselves ready to play Hereford. In the grand scheme of things, yes these games count on your record but they don’t in the grand scheme of things when you are trying to get into the tournament. We have to play these next five games with our hair on fire and get ready to get after them. We have to take them one game at a time. RIght now, our big focus is going to be Hereford.”
