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Bryson Hughes runs for his third touchdown of the first quarter. Reed City would win 46-22.
Pioneer Photo/Brendan Sanders
REMUS—Just 17 seconds was all it took for Reed City to put points up on the board Friday night in its conference matchup against Chippewa Hills.
Behind three first quarter touchdowns by Bryson Hughes and an interception return for a touchdown by Seth Jackson, Reed City shot out to a 32-8 lead after the end of the first quarter. Riding that momentum into halftime, the Coyotes led 46-8 and would cruise to a 46-22 victory over Chippewa Hills.
It was a good bounce back game after Reed City's 48-40 loss to Tri County last week.
"It was good to see us bounce back and come out an play strong, the first half, and set the tone right away," Shankel said. "We're getting a little bit more healthier with a few more bodies this week. So that always helps out. But our kids had a good week, a good week of practice."
Senior Bryson Hughes only had five carries on the evening, making his first start of the season after offseason shoulder surgery kept him out the first two games. Hughes made the most of his carries, scoring three touchdowns and racking up 127 rushing yards on the evening. Hughes expressed how happy he was to be playing so early in the season, after fearing he would be out until the playoff with his shoulder injury.
"Being able to play with them is really really heartwarming, it's memorable," Hughes said. "It brings back a lot of memories of the past and it's just now I can see what we can become. I can see that there's there's greatness in us and it's just a matter of going work."
Quarterback Xavier Allen would throw for 36 yards and a touchdown off of three completions. Zach Erickson would have three carries for 11 yards and a touchdown. John Ondrus would rush for 33 yards on nine carries and catch one pass for an 18-yard touchdown.
On the Chippewa Hills side, the Warriors showed good resilience after going down by as much as 38 points, closing the gap to 24 by the end of the game.
"They kicked us in the teeth at the beginning, first play goes 60 yards for a touchdown, and our heads dropped a little bit,"CH coach Mark PeLong said. "I'm proud of way that we responded. We came back down and and drove the field and scored a touchdown. There was a lot of positives tonight, obviously, they execute as good as any team that we're going to play and we're not quite there yet."
Scoring all three touchdowns on the evening was quarterback Gage Saathoff, who rushed for two goal-line touchdowns and completed a touchdown pass to Tyler Geer in the third quarter. He would throw for 187 yards with one passing touchdown and a interception on the night. Saathoff talked about what his team will be working on moving forward.
"Just not starting off scared and just be ready to go and have fun. That was a big one. We came out, had fun in the second half and scored points." Saathoff said.
Chippewa Hills is sitting at 0-3 will look to get their first win of the season against Central Montcalm at home next week. Central Montcalm is 1-2.
Reed City sits at 2-1 overall and 1-1 in the league and will host Big Rapids on Friday.
