KC tops No. 1 Blinn in OT

Photo by Lester Murray BRING HIM DOWN! — Kilgore College's Jimmy Anderson tackles a Blinn tailback, fighting for yards, in Saturday's Southwest Junior College Football Conference game between the schools. KC defeated Blinn, 20-17, in triple overtime — Blinn had been ranked the No. 1 junior college team in the nation. The Rangers, coached by J.J. Eckert, are now 2-2, and face Arkansas Baptist Saturday in Little Rock, Ark. The stat line for wide receiver Cortez Smith, a sophomore from Hooks, reads this way from Kilgore College's home game against No 1 Blinn last Saturday: six catches, 176 yards, two touchdowns.

But the importance of the second touchdown isn't conveyed there.

KC freshman quarterback Shane Fry hooked up with Smith in the very back corner of the south end zone at R.E. St. John Memorial Stadium on Saturday night with just 3.6 seconds left in regulation for a game-tying touchdown. The Rangers, courtesy of placekicker Rico Casas of Marshall, got the extra point and then Casas helped KC win the game in overtime, 20-17, with a 37-yard field goal.

Photo by Lester Murray MAKE A MOVE — KC's Frank Rodriguez (32) makes a catch against Blinn. The Rangers (2-2) are now 1- 1 in Southwest Junior College Football Conference play, and visit Arkansas Baptist on Saturday, a 3 p.m. kickoff.

"We are very fortunate right now to be 2-2," KC head coach J.J. Eckert said, noting that the combined record of KC's first four opponents is 13-3. "We've played four pretty good football teams, and for us to be 2-2 after that — it's just fortunate."

The Rangers have a history of giving Blinn fits, especially when the Bucs are highlyranked. KC was ranked as high as 14th to start the season, but then fell to 19th after a seasonopening loss to Fort Scott. The Rangers beat Tyler Junior College in a non-conference game, had an open week, then lost to Navarro at Corsicana Sept. 20 to open the conference schedule. Following the Navarro loss, the Rangers fell out of the NJCAA poll.

They didn't play like an unranked team Saturday against Blinn.

Kilgore College played well in the third quarter of its second game of the season against Tyler, scoring three touchdowns. But the Rangers played with that intensity the entire game against Blinn, forcing the Buccaneers to play a KC-style game (7-3 at halftime) rather than a score-fest.

In fact, the KC defense pretty much set the tone of the game. The unit held Blinn to just 248 total yards, about 200 yards under Blinn's per-game average and had some big plays, including a pair of sacks by Matt Jones. KC didn't let Blinn score a single point in overtime. They were energized by the return of cornerback Victor Carmichael, a sophomore safety from Waco, who finished with eight tackles.

Equally inspiring for the offense was the return to the lineup of tight end Woody Mc- Clendon, who had suffered a hand injury against Tyler, and only caught one pass for 9 yards against Blinn.

"To have those guys in there, though, helped us," Eckert noted.

Early-on, it looked like KC might get ran off its own field.

Blinn, which averaged right at 36 points per game coming into the contest, scored on a 14-yard pass from quarterback Terrance Cain to Dexter Ransom on a fourth-down play with 10:47 left in the first quarter, right after forcing KC to a three-andout.

But the remainder of the first half was a physical, hard-hitting, bet-I-can-outhit-you kind of game that saw only three more points scored. Casas came on with right at 13 minutes left in the second quarter and hit a 49-yard field goal, but officials threw a flag on Blinn for jumping offsides, and ironically, penalized Casas in a way, forcing him to kick it again, this time from 5 yards closer. Casas did it, putting KC on the board with 44-yarder. Blinn led 7-3, and in spite of both teams moving the ball between the 20-yard-lines — including a nice 21-yard pass play with Jesse Smitherman making a catch for KC — neither team managed to get more points.

Finally, the Rangers took the lead in the third quarter. Fry and Smith, just about 40 minutes from the eventual game-tying touchdown, hooked up for a score that put KC in front, 10-7, courtesy too of Casas' extra point.

But Blinn scored 10 points in the fourth quarter, and with 5:40 left led by a touchdown.

The game-tying drive began at Blinn's 36 with just over a minute and a half left in the game. KC's nine-play drive included a 22-yard catch by Luke Anderson on third-down-and- 21 and a 30-yard catch by Smith that set up the 3-yard touchdown pass from Fry to Smith, where Smith tiptoed on the red turf in the south end zone and set off a celebration.

Both teams had their problems in overtime, including Blinn committing a roughingthe kicker penalty that kept KC alive, an interception by Fry, and a KC touchdown called back on a holding penalty when it appeared tailback Cornelius Shackelford had scored.

Fry and fellow freshman quarterback Lane Johnson of Groveton totaled 38 pass attempts and threw for 301 yards, as the quarterback rotation continued.

"They played very well for about 55 total minutes," Eckert said, of the QBs. "Both made some mistakes, but they both made strides, too."

Eckert also complimented Dickinson freshman Yousef Nacouzi, a linebacker who played every snap, and Ram Rodriguez, a sophomore from Leander who saw his first start at safety.

Also, punter Reuben Rodriguez averaged 47 yards per punt, having punted six times in the game.

KC will be on the road for the next two weekends, visiting Arkansas Baptist this Saturday, then visiting Tyler at Rose Stadium on Saturday, Oct. 11. The Rangers are back home for homecoming Saturday, Oct. 18 against Trinity Valley.

KC's win over Blinn left Trinity Valley and Navarro the only two Southwest Junior College Football Conference schools without a conference loss — both of those schools are 2-0 in conference play. A host of schools — KC, Blinn, Tyler, and Northeastern Oklahoma A&M — are 1-1, and Arkansas Baptist and Cisco are both 0-2.