KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- Jody Grant wanted his Bentonville football to pick up the pace Friday night, and the Tigers were more than happy to oblige.
Bentonville kept Kansas City Rockhurst on its heels with its uptempo of play, jumped out to a 17-0 halftime lead, and the Tigers ushered in the era of their new head coach with a 24-13 victory over the Hawklets at Dasta Memorial Field.
"No doubt about it; our boys played fast," said Grant, who is in his first season with Bentonville, succeeding Barry Lunney. "Our guys flew around to the football on the defensive side of the ball early and got after it, and our offense played its guts out for a full 48 minutes.
"This first win feels pretty special. But ultimately it's about these kids and this program, so we're excited."
The Tigers (1-0) might have a new coach, but they maintained their balanced offensive attack. Quarterback Kasey Ford competed 18 of 23 passes for 185 yards and a touchdown, hitting seven different receivers, and Jacob Clark ran the ball 25 times for 114 yards and a score.
Bentonville scored first on a 4-yard run by Clark in the first quarter. Ford hit Kam'Ron Mayes-Hunt with a 25-yard touchdown pass to increase the lead to 14-0 in the second quarter. Hayden Moehring closed out the first-half scoring with a 33-yard field goal with no time remaining after Rockhurst (1-2) was called for roughing the kicker on a 48-yard attempt.
"We've been working on this for the entire summer," Ford said of the quick tempo. "We've been trying to get into shape with this offense and this offensive line, and we've been working on jetting the ball and catching defenses off-guard.
"We did a good job of that. We can tell we're a little out of shape, but if we keep on improving it's going to help us in the long run."
Bentonville's defense held Rockhurst tailback A.J. Taylor to 56 yards on 19 carries, although he did score on a 3-yard run to give the Hawklets their first points midway through the third quarter.
Taylor is orally committed to play college football at Wisconsin.
Bentonville countered Taylor's score and put the game out of reach when Avery Donson scored from 4 yards out with 9:11 remaining.
"We feel pretty good about how our kids reacted," said Rockhurst Coach Tony Severino, who has been head coach of the Hawklets since 1983. "We were pretty beat up coming into this game and playing a lot of young kids. We learned a lot of lessons, and it did us good.
"They knew we had a No. 2 quarterback in there, and we weren't going to throw the ball very effectively. But we got better as the game went on. We need to stop somebody, and we killed ourselves starting with the first possession. It turned things around for the rest of the first half."
GREENWOOD 63,
SPRINGDALE 28
GREENWOOD — Jordan Green ran for 253 yards and four touchdowns and Ryan Padilla had more than 200 yards receiving as Greenwood (1-0) handed Springdale (0-1) its 14th consecutive loss.
Green scored on a 63-yard run on his first carry. He also had touchdown runs of 43 and 49 yards.
Padilla caught 10 passes for 214 yards and 1 touchdown as Greenwood piled up 676 yards a of offense, including more than 500 in the first half .
Greenwood quarterback Luke Hales completed 11 of 14 passes for 227 yards and 3 touchdown, and Connor Noland was 11 of 15 for 176 yards and 2 touchdowns.
Springdale quarterback Jack Lindsey completed 18 of 32 passes for 209 yards and 2 touchdowns. Kyler Williams had a career-high 153 yards receiving for Springdale.
Sports on 09/05/2015