“We came in with sour mouths from last year, so we came in with a chip on our shoulders,” senior safety Kamron Hall said. “We just dominated them all four years, and that’s the goal – 16-0, then go to state.”
In their impressive season opener Friday night, the Bearcats hosted a familiar foe in the No. 11 Denton Guyer Wildcats, a Class 6A power who has faced Aledo in each of the teams’ last four seasons. In this matchup, the Bearcats used a stalwart effort defensively, coupled with methodical run-heavy offensive drives to grind out a 21-14 victory at Tim Buchanan Stadium.
“Give those guys some credit, their defense is really stout, I thought our defense maybe outplayed them a little bit tonight,” Bearcats head coach Robby Jones said. “Great job by our defense. Max Forman stepped in and did a great job and I think Cason Miller rotated in there some at the defensive end, just imagine when we get Carson (Dempsey) back, we’re going to be even better.”
The game started out shaky when Aledo received the game’s opening kickoff. The first play from scrimmage saw a handoff to senior running back Kaden Winkfield hit the gridiron after a fumble, which was recovered by Denton Guyer at its own 47 seconds into the contest. Despite that, Aledo’s defense bent but did not break in keeping the Wildcats out of the red zone. Facing 4th-and-9 from the Aledo 28, the Wildcats saw their promising drive end after the Bearcats forced an incomplete pass from Zephyr Kreye, who was harassed all night by orange-and-black defenders (6-for-22 passes completed for 93 yards).
Following the defensive stand, the Bearcats marched down the field on an 11-play, 72-yard scoring drive that was capped off by a two-yard plunge from running back Brady Powell at the 1:17 mark of the first quarter. After Payton Shaffer drilled the extra point, Aledo held a 7-0 lead.
The Bearcats forced a three-and-out but threw an interception at their own 39 on its ensuing position, which set Guyer up at the Aledo 14 following the return. Despite that, Aledo forced Denton Guyer to line up for a 38-yard field goal try with 8:36 left before halftime, which Hall blocked after exploding around the edge and batting the ball away. Aledo then capitalized on its momentum and doubled its lead after another scoring drive, which concluded with an 18-yard burst up the middle by Winkfield. The Bearcats’ 14-0 lead with 5:32 left held up as the halftime score.
“A couple big runs by him and I thought the offensive line did a great job of opening up some holes for him,” Jones said of Winkfield. “Great job by Kaden, he did what we expected out of him, which is why he’s getting recruited by some big-time colleges.”
The Wildcats were limited to 40 total yards of offense (34 rushing, six passing) and two total first downs after the game’s initial two quarters. However, the visiting team got off the bus for the second half of play.
The Wildcats needed just four plays, the last one being a 37-yard scoring run to cut the deficit in half at 14-7 with just 62 seconds of the game clock. After the teams exchanged three-and-out possessions, Aledo had the ball with a chance to reclaim a double-digit lead, and Winkfield surged the team into a scoring opportunity after he exploded to the Denton Guyer 10 following a 49-yard run. From there, the Bearcats paved the way for Winkfield to find paydirt from a yard out, which pushed the lead to 21-7 with 4:18 left in the third quarter.
With the bright lights burning down on the field and fanbases alike, the heavyweight battle moved to its climactic fourth quarter, where Aledo was able to hold off a formidable challenge by the Wildcats through great angles, execution, outside contain and pursuit of the football. And, to the surprise of legendary athletes like Allen Iverson, practice is the foundation of the Bearcats’ on-field success.
“Practice. Every day we have practice and we go through the plays, like, 100 times,” Bearcats senior Cooper Cyphers said. “You just gotta know it all to get locked in before the game. We felt really confident coming in, we watched a lot of film – we have film every day. We have to know the plays because, if we don’t, we will mess up and they will score.”
The defensive alignment and execution was a sight to behold, and Jones credited his defensive staff for efficiently utilizing practice time to sharpen the players’ technique, knowledge, alignments and techniques. In spite of missed tackles leading to 49-yard Denton Guyer score late in the fourth quarter, Aledo stood tall and ended the game with a strong defensive stand, which saw Guyer fail to convert on a 4th-and-5 play from its own 40 with under two minutes to go.
“That’s one of the things we’ve talked about is going out and finishing,” Jones said. “That was the goal coming out of halftime, to finish the game the right way. To see the defense get that stop there to seal the game late was great.”
As a team, the Bearcats passed for 45 yards and ran for 205 yards. Defensively, Aledo limited Guyer to 93 passing yards and 162 passing yards. The Bearcat defense clamped down in the first half, holding the Wildcats to 40 total yards of offense and two first downs. Offensively, Jones said the team will aim to refine and sharpen the passing game moving forward with split duties expected for the foreseeable future between Lincoln Tubbs and Nash McElree.
“We need to clean up the passing game a little bit. We have one of the best receivers in the state of Texas (Kaydon Finley), and we need to be able to get him the ball,” Jones said. “We have to work on the timing with the quarterbacks and Kaydon to get those connections. Other than that, it’s just not missing tackles.”
“Either one of them can throw, so that’s not a part of it, but having Lincoln (Tubbs) out wide is another threat out there. We just have to get comfortable with our personnel and who’s doing what,” Jones said. “You’ll continue to see both of them at quarterback for a while.”
Winkfield carried the ball 12 times for 88 yards and two scores while Tubbs added 44 rushing yards, 22 receiving yards and six passing yards. Powell was impactful with eight carries for 65 yards and one touchdown while McElree completed 7-for-11 of his passes for 39 yards. Additionally, Finley caught four passes for 15 yards.
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