CARROLLTON - As soon as he heard that he heard the number of touchdowns he threw, quarterback Wade Prough was disappointed.
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“I was so close,” Prough said aghast.
Last year he broke the Carrollton single-game record for passing touchdowns with six and he tied it last night against rivals North Greene.
More importantly the Carrollton Hawks won their third consecutive game and get back to the .500 mark with a 51-14 victory over the Spartans (1-5).
“It’s a good feeling,” Carrollton coach Nick Flowers said. “Week in and week out we continue to coach the kids up and our kids have continued to work. We have fighters and great kids. We’ve gotten here by continuing to get better and battling.”
In addition to Prough’s six touchdowns, he threw for 287 yards. He’s now thrown 18 touchdowns and six interceptions on the season with 1,426 passing yards.
The Hawks started out cold for their first two possessions as the Spartans defensive line snuffed out every run play and Prough overthrew his intended targets.
“We had our struggles up front, but I think we got it straightened out and everything worked out,” Prough said.
With 4:15 left in the first quarter, on a fourth and goal from the 13, Prough hit Brendan Settles on a screen pass who lateraled to Jerrett Smith and the running back galloped to the end zone to complete the hook-and-lateral.
The Hawks led 6-0, but North Greene immediately responded. Dalton McDonald took a toss to the right, outran the Carrollton players to edges, and sped away for a 78-yard touchdown. The Spartans two-point conversion gave them an 8-6 lead.
“In the first (quarter) I was a little shaky. They got good pressure on me, I couldn’t set my feet,” Prough said. “In the second quarter I settled down and everything kind of mellowed out.”
Prough and the Carrollton offense got into a groove as the second quarter began. Smith caught a 20-yard pass for a touchdown to give the lead back to the Hawks at 14-8. After a key interception by Brendan Settles on a fourth down at midfield, Prough hooked up with Smith for the third time on a 43-yard jump ball that was brilliantly hauled in by Smith and managed to shake off his defender in the process.
Early in the third quarter, Prough pulled off a magnificent play by scrambling out of the pocket and hitting Jeremy Watson on the run, in stride for a 64-yard score to give the Hawks a 26-8 lead. On the next possession Smith took a handoff, stiff-armed a Spartan and broke off a 72-yard rushing touchdown.
After a North Greene touchdown to make it 39-14, Prough hit Watson again for another long touchdown play. This time it was from 67 yards out on slant pass.
Smith scored on two more touchdowns in the fourth quarter, coming consecutive plays as Carrollton recovered a fumble on the ensuing kickoff after Smith’s first.
Flowers didn’t necessarily want to air-raid the North Greene secondary in the second half, but they were given several opportunities with a lot of blitzing.
“We really didn’t want to throw later in the game, but they were bringing so much pressure on us and what they were doing coverage wise on us, they were giving us a lot of opportunities to throw the ball. That’s one thing that I love about our offense, when they stop one thing we feel like we have to go to something that’s there. I’ll live and die by the spread offense with the options that it gives us.”
Carrollton has fifty-balled each of their opponents during their three-game winning streak and have averaged 51 points, however Flowers estimates that the Hawks are yet to reach their potential and perhaps haven’t even sniffed it.
“We are so far from peaking as a team,” Flowers said. “I think being able to win like we did and still have things to fix it shows that we got a pretty good team and got to continue to get better.”
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