FLAWED PERFORMANCE; Owls suffer third straight loss as miscues lead to Eagles’ first half surge

By Terry Collins Courier Sports

WESTMORELAND — The Smith County High Owls football team traveled to Westmoreland to face off against the Eagles last Friday night in a battle of 1-2 teams.

The hosts rolled up 194 first half yards to build a 31-8 halftime lead on their way to a 40-14 victory over Smith County.

Smith Co. dropped to 1-3 overall as the setback was their second consecutive in Westmoreland.

“We battled against a really good, physical and tough Westmoreland team,” said Smith County head coach Matt Dyer. “We got in the hole early giving up two scores early in the first quarter, but we settled down after that and forced a couple of punts. We had some drives going but penalties and turnovers killed us. We have to respond to adversity a lot better than what we did against Westmoreland.”

Westmoreland had 241 of their total 292 yards on the ground as they used eight different ball carriers on 41 attempts.

Grant Lilly led the hosts’ ground attack with seven carries for 92 yards and a touchdown. Dylan Gann had 10 carries for 69 yards and two touchdowns. 

“We had a hard time containing their run game in the second half and gave up too many big plays on the ground,” said Dyer. “We didn’t make plays when we needed to and Westmoreland did. Our guys played hard. We’ll learn a lot from this loss, but it will not define who we are or determine the course of our season. We have played some really good teams so far, and now region play starts. We were nowhere as consistent as we need to be on offense and had way too many missed assignments upfront in the run game and pass protection.”

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