Jags fall to Vestavia Hills in region opener
VESTAVIA HILLS -- A.J. Powell never got into a groove offensively last season, but now that the Vestavia Hills High School senior is locked in on one position, he and the Rebels offense are off to the races.
Powell rushed for 219 yards on 15 carries in Vestavia Hills’ 45-7 Class 7A, Region 3 home win over Spain Park. The senior added three touchdowns and scored on an 80-yard rush on the team’s second play just 17 seconds into the game.
“It was a simple play, a toss right”, quarterback Eli Sawyer said.
It’s a play the Rebels run routinely and Spain Park coach Shawn Raney knew it.
“We just mis-fit it,” Raney said. “It’s a toss play just like playing the option. They’re going to run it and run it. You can fit it right eight times and the ninth time happens to be a bust. That just happened the first time. We mis-fit it and didn’t get under the fullback like we were supposed to and it was out the gate.”
“It gave us the momentum and once we got it we ran with it,” added Sawyer.
Vestavia Hills led 31-7 at half. Powell, the team’s starting running back, added a 7-yard touchdown run early in the second quarter and a 62-yard touchdown in the third to close the scoring. He had an 80-yard touchdown run called back because of holding.
“It felt great, man,” Powell said. “It was all because of my line. We had great blocking all night and we got to keep our defense off the field.”
Vestavia Hills (2-0, 1-0) won its first game 49-7 over Homewood. The Rebels hit 40 points just twice last year, and once was in the season finale. The Rebels rushed for 329 yards and Sawyer hit 7-of-13 passes for 104 yards, all in the first half.
“We just have a great line and great leadership, led by Eli,” Powell said. “We just had great blocking down field. Our fullback gave us a good look (on the first touchdown). I saw the cut and I got open.”
A low snap caused the Spain Park punter to field the ball with his knee on the ground at his 15 after the Jaguars’ first possession. Landon Neese scored on a 14-yard run to make it 14-0. Sawyer threw a 16-yard touchdown pass to Peyton Walraven and Matthew McMeans had a 39-yard field goal in the first half.
Vestavia Hills scored a special teams touchdown when Tyler Moore blocked a punt that Brock Payne picked up and scored from 15 yards out early in the third quarter.
“I’m real proud of all of our kids,” Rebels head coach Buddy Anderson said. “We still made a lot of mistakes, but they played hard and overcame our mistakes.”
(Powell) had a great game. They gave him some seams to run and he’s got great speed. He hit those and he did a great job.”
Spain Park dropped to 1-2, 0-1 in region play. The Jaguars’ defense has struggled, giving up an average of 40 points per game through three contests. Spain Park’s only score came on an 80-yard touchdown pass from Harrison Barker to Cooper Kelley in the first quarter.
Kelley caught about a 20-yard slant, causing two Rebel defenders to crash into each other, and was off to the races. But that was the lone highlight for Spain Park. Barker finished 10-of-17 for 155 yards.
“I never thought we got going offensively,” Raney said. “We never got any momentum at all. We got off the bus and everything went wrong, pretty much. It’s something we’ve got to try to fix.”
Vestavia Hills is at Tuscaloosa County next week and Spain Park hosts Mountain Brook.
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