Spartans earn jamboree victory following eventful 2 weeks
CALERA – It was simply good to be playing football again.
That was the message from Chris Yeager, who led his Mountain Brook High School football team to a 31-14 win over Calera on Saturday evening at Ricky M. Cairns Memorial Stadium.
“There are a lot of things we’ve got to correct, but the bottom line is, we played football tonight,” the Spartans head coach said following the game. “That’s the most important thing.”
After a chaotic few weeks that saw Mountain Brook’s first two games be either canceled or postponed, the Spartans and Calera agreed to a contest at the 11th hour. Mountain Brook was slated to play Vestavia Hills last Friday, but the Rebels canceled their first two games due to COVID-19 concerns. The Spartans were due to host Huntsville on Friday, but the Panthers backed out due to weather-related travel concerns.
That left Mountain Brook scrambling on Friday morning.
“It’s been a rollercoaster,” Yeager said. “When the Huntsville game got canceled, I’ve never seen so much despair in their [the players’] faces. It made me realize how important this was.”
The game did not count toward Mountain Brook’s record, but that didn’t matter on Saturday.
“When I said we’ve got a game, there was elation and joy,” Yeager said.
On the field, Mountain Brook looked the part of the top-ranked team in Class 6A in the first half. The Spartans scored each of their first five times with the football, building a 31-0 lead at halftime.
Michael Brogan got the scoring started with a 4-yard run, just the start of a big night for the senior. He was a bell cow, toting the ball 28 times for 158 yards on the night. George Cain and Kamp McMinn were strong out of the backfield as well, with Cain scoring a touchdown and McMinn totaling 55 yards.
“The backs ran real hard. We’ve got some things to work on there, but it was encouraging to see them run behind their pads,” Yeager said. “That was sort of Mountain Brook football, 4 and 5 yards at a time.”
Yeager was also pleased with his senior quarterback Strother Gibbs, who connected on scoring strikes of 79 yards to Sims Brown and 41 yards to Paulson Wright in the opening half. He finished 7-of-12 for 210 yards. Brown had 126 yards, Wright finished with 53 and Jake Thompson had a 41-yard grab of his own.
Reed Harradine converted a 23-yard field goal and connected on all four of his extra-point tries as well.
Calera scored on its first two offensive plays of the second half, forcing the Spartans to reinsert their starters for the remainder of the contest. Outside of those two plays, they held Calera to 121 total yards and kept athletic quarterback Tyler Nelson in check. Nelson completed just 5-of-18 passes for 103 yards, one of those completions a 75-yard strike to Kobe Prentice. Kris Cotton led the Eagles with 43 rushing yards on 11 carries.
“I love to see the progress of how hard we played even though we were tired and as the game went on, our tackling in space got better,” Yeager said.
Mountain Brook is slated to officially begin its season next week, as it takes on Woodlawn at Lawson Field in a Class 6A, Region 5 matchup. Calera is set to host Pelham in region play as well.
Click here to view and purchase photos from the game.